Death Stare of the Emperor
by BanterHorse
Summary: An Eversor assassin uncovers a Chaos cult, and is hurled into the Warp while uprooting it. By strange contrivance he is sent to Terra. But it is not the Terra he was created on. It is a world of heroes and villains. With no mission or handlers to chain him down, this drug-crazed killing machine must forge his destiny in a world that challenges his very existence.
1. Apocalypse Unbound

**A/N: This story has been sitting around for a while, I started it when I first read Death Korps of Justice. I simply could not resist creating a story on the same vein.**

**It took me a while to settle on an Eversor Assassin, first it was a Arbites Judge, then a Battle Sister, then a Space Marine. I needed something that really epitomized the spirit of Warhammer 40,000.**

**I put down a list of requirements. It had to wear a skull helmet, it needed to be angry, it had to be super-human, and it needed to be as far off DC's hero mentality as humanly possible. My first thought was: Chaplain Lemartes! But I eventually landed on Eversor, because in addition to doing all of these things, it also explodes when you kill it. Nothing gets more 40k than that.**

* * *

It was called the Hecatomb. A facility buried in the depths of a rogue asteroid, whose very existence was a tightly held secret. For the Officio Assassinorum drones that toiled here, the very halls seemed to radiate a palpable aura of death and terror. Not so unfitting for a storage vault of the legendary Eversor Temple.

The Hecatomb had been Aric Gissen's home and prison for the last twenty-three years, and not one of them had been in any way kind to him. His old promising life in the Schola Progenium felt like it had happened centuries ago rather than a little over two decades, but time seemed to traverse differently in this dreary madhouse tumbling through empty space. Creases now lined his face, crows feet had formed around his eyes, and his black hair had begun to gray at the temples.

_'You must endure the inevitable consequences of your actions.' _the wrinkled old tutor abbot's voice still echoed forth from memory, as clear as the day the Schola prefects first dragged him from the dormitory, accusing him of academic sin. In layman parlance, he had been caught cheating. And they could not have that.

They had beat him of course, made him repent his dishonesty. It had felt so right back then, to alter his exam scores. He did not want to spend the rest of his life as an insignificant Administratum clerk toiling in a mailroom till the Warp froze over. He had always envisioned himself as a Commissar, a Stormtrooper, or even Emperor willing, an Inquisitorial aide. Looking back at his life so far, he probably should have left well enough alone.

The Officio Assassinorum was a grim and heartless organization to work for. There was no retirement plan, non-existent employee benefits, and his overseer scared the Emperor-loving shit out of him. He was the very definition of the word 'expendable' at any time his superiors could activate the capsule of neurotoxin buried into his skull to render him immediately brain dead. At least in the Administratum he could write himself off as deceased, and steal a few blank promissory notes to get himself relocated to a paradise world. There was no escape from the Hecatomb, he was going to die here, and his body would be rendered down into a paste to feed the servitors that operated the numerous arcane systems.

Life on the Hecatomb was only made worse by the fact that there were no women on this rock that were not comatose psychotics or mindless cybernetic automata. It was a policy invented by some soul shriven Officio bureaucrat holed up on Terra, out of belief that women would be an unnecessary distraction. Plus the Hecatomb supported neither a maternity leave policy or a nursery to support the consequences of intermixing genders. Obviously they did not think what kind of atmosphere this would generate in the workplace. Indeed when Aric first arrived, he had to fend off one horny sodomite after another in his off duty hours, and hide when groups banded together to hunt the 'new meat'... he did not always escape. And even when he grew too old for the degenerates to find attractive, he would still be occasionally awakened in his rack by pleasured masculine groans from the bunk above him. It was fair to say that by now he was completely erotophobic.

He hated this rock. He hated his co-workers. He hated his life. And he especially hated the assassins.

The Eversor assassins. There was nothing in the galaxy quite like them. On any given world in the Imperium, one could expect to find individuals who will end the life of someone for a shine of throne gelt, these people have the nerve to label themselves as assassins. Comparing those low-life blades for hire to an Eversor was like comparing a kitten to a Catachan Devil.

The Officio Assassinorum produced the core of Man's homicidal elite. The Vindicare, who only glimpsed society through the scope of a rifle, to end rebellions with a single shot. The Culexus, soulless and the root of fear for all touched by the Warp, to prey upon the most illusive of gifted apostates. Callidus, bereft of identity and divorced from honesty, so death could be meted from a familiar face. And then there was Eversor. A microcosm of brutality, that lives only to kill, to strike terror in the hearts of those who would doubt the Officio's mandate.

And all existed only to visit judgment upon the Emperor's enemies. They were weapons, and the Eversor was the most monstrous of all them.

But that was only part of why they so disgusted him.

It was disgust that he felt every time he descended into 'The Gallery' a cavernous octagonal corridor with a narrow catwalk running through it, flanked on all sides by a row of dark plasteel coffins featureless save for Gothic numerals etched into their surfaces. It was cold, and stank of madness and decay, a metal surfaced mausoleum. Here rested the vanguard of the Emperor's unforgiving contempt of human folly.

Shaking off his unease, Aric proceeded to stasis unit CIXIV. The status monitors wreathing the foreboding casket produced a putrid green glow that seemed to dampen what little color that was present in the chamber. Slowly he began the rites of release. After manipulating the runed keys on the control altar in the correct order, the coffin hissed and it's face parted down the middle and slid to either side to reveal an armacrys cylinder, and he beheld the face of death.

A barely human husk of overbuilt muscle and bionics was suspended in a foetal position within it's fluid cell. It gazed back at him through vacant, lightless eyes, the augmetics fused into it's post-human flesh twitched in spite of it's comatose state.

On one monitor, the creature's combat history scrolled down. Unit service life: seven years. Number of deployments: five-hundred-and-seventy-six. Estimated enemy casualties inflicted: seventeen-thousand-three-hundred-and-twenty-eight, including collateral damage.

Biological age: sixteen standard years.

Aptitude level: Epsilon-Dan

Then there was the medical history.

L2-L5 lumbar vertebrae shattered from a Tyranid hive tyrant. Detached median nerve in right arm by Dark Eldar haemonculus. Severed mandible below ramus in close combat with a Khornate Champion. Electrical burns 42.4 % of upper torso by Black Legion Chaos sorcerer. Left arm crushed below elbow by an Ork warboss. Two-hundred forty-three separate stubber and lasgun wounds. Eighteen cardiac arrests and automated restarts. And the list went on. By all the saints and primarchs, what did it take to kill these abominable things?

Aric keyed up the activation routine. Details of CIXIV's newest mission was downloaded into the assassin's neural cortex. Moments later the tube raised out of it's alcove and guided by an overhanging servitor onto a monorailed track that ran down the length of the hall. Aric followed the tube and it's inactive occupant to the arming chapel.

The fluid tomb was lowered onto a center pedestal, robed tech adepts chanted in their secret buzzing dialect, the stasis compound was drained out. The tube opened, and another servitor came forward. It delicately removed the unresponsive body from the tube and onto an empty frame, where its arms and legs were held fast by invisible restraining fields.

The chanting grew louder as sanctified cleansing oils were applied to scarred hardened flesh, bionic systems blessed and sanctified in the name of the machine god. The rack was flipped to a standing position as two servo arms rose from the floor, their ends furnished with delicate sprayers. They chanted again and the arms began to move.

Working up from the feet, a layer of black glossy material was strategically sprayed onto the assassin's bare flesh. This was synskin, a bio-reactive bodysuit utilized predominately by the Officio's agents. There were several varieties, and each temple had a unique pattern tailored exclusively to their code of operations.

When the sprayers were finished, every part of CIXIV's body save for his head was covered in the gleaming, wet textured material. One of the tech adepts had produced a compact pistol-shaped device, with a wide slot shaped barrel. When activated it emitted a ray of cyan light, that upon touching the freshly applied synskin, caused it to lose it's smooth gloss finish and adopt a non-reflective texture morbidly reminiscent of exposed skeletal muscles.

Next came the murder dress. First the various armaplas coated tubes comprising CIXIV's infusion transfer system were connected to various metal ports around his body left uncovered by the synskin. After than the assassin's ceramite and plasteel armored torso plate was mounted. The left side was dominated by the extractor. It filtered out the chemical waste byproduct created by the drugs running through it's system and vented it out through the circular grill as a noxious vapor. The backpack, which contained CIXIV's allotment of combat drugs and macrostimulants as well as the arcane omni-scope mast was fitted to his back, it whirred as it connected to the injector seats located on each of his thoraic vertebrae. Segmented plates wrapped around the thighs. Boots, greaves, and knee guards fashioned into skulls followed. The deadly neurogauntlet was fitted onto the left arm, it's hyper-alloy claws glinted menacingly in the low light, an ordinary armored glove and gauntlet sheathed the right. Finally the skull shaped helmet was fitted over CIXIV's head, the lower part was fitted directly onto the assassin's bionic lower jaw; completing the grotesque leering visage of death that was the hallmark of the Eversor Temple.

The tech adepts continued to the rites of rearmament. The armacrys ampules connected to the neurogauntlet were ritually filled with mutagenic acid, frag grenades were clasped to the belt, a Terran manufactured Executioner bolt pistol was mag-clamped to the thigh, melta bombs harnessed beneath the backpack, a power sword was sheathed behind the left shoulder.

Aric observed as the adepts finished the process and moved the still comatose Eversor assassin into the special one-man drop pod, where he would remain until the commencement of his mission. He hated CIXIV and all his brothers and sisters, hated the fact that the humanity was so flawed as to need such monstrosities to keep it in check. He prayed for the swift destruction of mankind's enemies, so that beasts such as them would be disposed of, before they ply their mockeries of lives the only way they know how.

With resignation he signed the confirmation order. He had seen the creature rearmed and primed for activation. It was all in the Emperor's hands now.

* * *

There was no dreaming in stasis. Brain activity was held close to terminal levels, vitals frozen to a crawl. It was the sleep of the dead.

It felt like a moment had passed since he was put under following his previous mission.

The wake-up call came as it always did. Eight ounces of pure amphetamine, flowed into his body. Enough to make a man's heart explode inside his chest, barely enough to stir a pound of enhanced cardiac muscle; six chambers – four organic, two artificial – flexed as they pumped blood through a mixture of natural and synthetic arteries.

CIXIV awoke, body aching, veins dry.

He drew breath through augmetic lungs, functionally superior to the original organs they replaced. A gentle thump reverberated through his chest cavity as he exhaled slowly.

He was in a drop pod, mid descent stage. Twenty-four seconds until contact.

There was thirst. The combat drugs were not running through him yet, making him feel weak, hollow. Had to find something to kill.

Directives flashed through his head as his attention curled around the maps in his mind and scuttled around genemarkers and images of the target. His Primary.

His mission was to assassinate Grand Premier Nalaji Prodeur and his _entire _house, a total of one-hundred-fifty-three targets with ages ranging from over two-hundred years to only a few months old. They all needed to die.

_'Find... heretics... kill heretics... Praise... God-Emperor.' _

The altimeter cycled down with mocking slowness, making the assassin wait. It hated waiting! The start of the mission was always the worst for CIXIV, alone in a plummeting drop pod with nothing to do. With no drugs to stave off the shakes and chills, praise the Emperor.

He wanted to scream, wanted to bellow and rage and chatter as he normally did while under the needle. Could not find his voice in this state, stuck to moving his lips behind the mask in a ceaseless litany.

_'Blood-too-dry-recharge-and-kill-and-repeat-and-sleep-victory-in-the-name-of-the-Emperor.'_

Ten seconds.

He shifted, snapped impotently at the imposed countdown. Hypodermics still beyond reach. Flavorless tepid blood flowed faster through the veins, wanted so much to spit it out, it felt so vile and joyless.

Five seconds.

Breathing increased, fingers flexed. The mask's teeth rapidly split apart and snapped together in tiny increments, the first of many seizures to come.

One second.

The assassin finally found it's voice and used it to scream with want.

* * *

The silent monotony of the palatial royal wing was shattered when a tall black pod tore through the roof, fell through the floors, and settled on the middle level wedged between two plasteel girders halfway between floors. It's psychotic payload was released moments later.

When confronted by a skull-faced superhuman, loosely held together by drugs, and armed with a wide variety of weapons, reactions tended to lean mostly towards gut-wrenching terror followed by dying howls of agony as ones guts were actually torn out by aforementioned embodiment of death and faith. And this recent deviant faction to come under the Officio Assassinorum's lethal notice was doing nothing to buck this trend.

_**"KILL!KILL!KILL! BLOOOOD! VENGEANCE!" **_the Eversor howled as he used his terrible claws to disembowel a frightened royal armsman, whilst diagonally bisecting another with his power sword.

Subdermal augmetics, genetically overdeveloped musculature, and psychotic bloodlust drove the pharmacological nightmare forward. Chemical agents swam through veins hard as tree bark, pushed under enormous pressure by a heart hammering at over three-hundred beats per-minute. The Eversor was only truly alive when it was killing.

A trail of victims littered the Eversor's path from here to his point of entry into the government palace, some had been guards, some servants, and others were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Some of these people may have been loyal, Emperor-fearing subjects of the Imperium, but their connection to the Primary – though peripheral – was enough to warrant their violent executions, in the eyes of the Officio.

The Eversor met sterner resistance as he carved his way closer to the heart of the palace, where he would find the Primary, dispense judgement, and kill every secondary that was connected to him. He was going to exterminate the entire royal family.

The assassin's boot connected to an ornate door fashioned from imported wood; the force of the strike knocking it off plasteel hinges and sending it crashing into the room beyond, eliciting surprised shrieks from the occupants within. The apex murderer stalked into the room, muscles barely registering the effor of each footfall. The omni-scope mounted atop the retractable mast behind his right shoulder endowed the assassin with a three-hundred-sixty degree panoramic view of the room the moment he stepped in. He registered six targets, four armed men, an unarmed elderly woman, and a toddler.

The Executioner bolt-pistol was in the Eversor's right hand in an instant, before the guards could bring their antiquated las-locks to bear, the assassin fired four times in quick succession. Four men toppled to the floor with gaping craters in their chests.

"Mercy my lord! He's only two years old!" The old woman, a nanny presumably pleaded to the murderous agent of Imperial justice. The assassin was unmoved, the biological age of his targets was inconsequential to him; the Emperor's judgment was swift and absolute, no matter age or gender.

"No exceptions," the Eversor hissed as it stalked towards the two.

"I won't let you!" She cried, charging the assassin. Only to have her chest cavity married to the Eversor's neurogauntlet before being divorced and sent flying off to the side into the wall, she did not get up again.

The assassin then leveled his pistol at the child, uncaring of the boy's frightened tearful eyes. The needle gun seamlessly built into the pistol made a soft click, a crystalline toxic splinter entered the child's body, he was dead in a little over a second.

Similar dramas played out as the Eversor continued to purge the royal wing of the Primary's relatives and extended family. This was made easier by the human instinct to seek comfort with familiar faces in chaotic situations, they were grouping together, conveniently expediting their collective liquidation. The harvest was good, and the Emperor was pleased.

Hypodermic needles worked like pistons stabbing into his upper spinal column, urging him towards his ultimate objective. Leaving the royal wing a gore strewn abattoir of severed limbs and mutilated corpses, he fought his way into the inner palace.

_'KillburndestroypraisetheEmperorfindkillslayfortheGoldenThroneshootburnexterminatethehereticpraisetheEmperor. Praise! PRAISE!' _

_**"PRAAAAIIISSSEEE!" **_The Eversor roared as it vaulted off a mezzanine overlooking an atrium packed with nobles and other worthies, the Imperial assassin landed in their midst power sword crackling disruptive energy, neurogauntlet infused with toxic death, his reality devolved into a storm of screams and blood.

Countess Justine Wralder, heiress of a wealthy dynasty in a neighboring star system. Recipient of countless cosmetic alterations to make her beauty unrivaled, her famed visage was reduced to an explosion of blood, bone, brains, and biosilicon strips by a plasteel armored boot driving it into the marble floor.

Director Karl Shoeler, the chief overseer of the Departmento Munitorum labor camps in the system. Suspected of malfeasance. Cut cleanly down the middle by the assassin's glowing adamantium blade.

Lord Valo Kurn, chairman of the House of Nobles. Confirmed heretic. Willfully trafficked illegal xenos artifacts, linked to the disappearance of several ranking Administratum customs officials. Screamed like a child while his spine was torn from his body.

Captain Lorym Balasta. Rogue Trader. Associated with Valo Kurn. Aided Kurn in coveting and transporting illegal xenos artifacts. Throat crushed by Valo Kurn's detached spine, used by the assassin as an improvised cudgel.

The Eversor slew everything in sight without regard for social rank. There were no innocents here, only degrees of heretical complicity. He thanked the Emperor for granting him the privilege in punishing them. Alas his strict time table only allowed a little over half the room's occupants to be brought to judgment before the golden-eagle-double-header voice urged him forwards toward the Primary. So much to do. So much to do.

Dashing into a vaulted gallery, the Eversor was once more accosted by guards, this time augmented with the presence of three combat servitors. The lurching, cybernetic constructs leveled arm mounted heavy stubbers at him and opened fire. The assassin deftly leaped above their overlapping fields of fire, using his momentum he along the length of a gilded wall for several paces, outrunning the hailstorm of tracers that chased his steps.

_'Find the heretic! Slay the unbeliever! Find-and-kill-rip-and-tear-and-eliminate! Praise the God-Emperor! Murder! Death! Kill!'_

The Eversor slammed into the servitors, gutting the fools around them, scrambling over the hulking, lobotomized guardians, neurogauntlet leaving deep gouges that burned the life out of them with poison moments later. The eagle in his head screeched with satisfaction.

_'Hunt the heretic! Destroy the heretic! Burn-and-eviscerate-and-decapitate! Praise the- what?'_

A manservant, held by the throat, claws held back in preparation to cease circulatory functions. The man's half black half white robe was disheveled by the assassin's rough handling, parting to reveal the edge of _something _under the left collar bone. The assassin forced the fabric aside to get a proper look at it. His mental chatter ceased.

A skull, bicolored black and white, imposed over an eight pointed star.

When most people look at an Eversor assassin, they see a mindless killing machine. In reality however, an Eversor was a highly intelligent killing machine, capable of conducting field interrogations, operating virtually every type of Imperial vehicle, and constructing crude melta charges from various appliances. So upon seeing the blasphemous mark of Chaos, the ramifications this discovery had on his mission became immediately clear to the assassin.

With a thought the secure vox-link was established.

_"Status." _a terse voice immediately commanded.

"Code: Omega-Extremis detected in mission area."

There was silence, _"Acknowledged. Contingency protocol 21-Nu is in effect."_

"Understood," the assassin growled.

He was going to purify this place the only way he knew how.

But first he needed to have a few words in private with his new best friend.

* * *

The heretic had revealed much. Under the influence of the interrogation drugs, the man had figuratively spilled his guts to the assassin, before he in his generosity did so literally. It was clear that the Great Enemy had planted its vile seeds but a handful of terran years ago. Not that it mattered to the Eversor, soon there would be nothing left to perpetuate this abominable affront to the God-Emperor.

His original mission overridden, the assassin turned his unstoppable rampage upon every inhabitant of the palace. Nothing was spared, servants, children, guards, techpriests, courtesans, pets, concubines, visiting dignitaries, even the cockroaches in the kitchen; it mattered not who they were, no chances could be taken at this point, everyone in this place was now a primary.

Delving into the sublevels below the palace, the assassin was disgruntled by the distinct lack of targets to destroy. Blasphemous icons and writings became more commonplace the deeper he went, words whose meaning and arrangement caused the assassin more discomfort and hatred than the opiates coursing through his veins ever did.

He now stood before a large plasteel door, the foul images daubed upon the surface burned the Eversor's unblinking eyes behind his death mask, his omni-scope could not pierce the door and reveal what lay ahead. It did not matter, the God-Emperor's will would be done.

His hand gravitated to one of three melta bombs fitted underneath the backpack which housed his replacement fluids and infusion reserves. The melta bomb was a powerful explosive device that radiated a destructive pulse of intense thermal energy on detonation. This one originated from the most recent pattern, incorporating features innovated from studying captured Federation technology. Rather than releasing it's energy all at once, the new pattern incorporated a stasis device that sustained the detonation for several seconds, vastly increasing the amount of damage to a target. Such weapons were for the time being limited to the Inquisition, the Eversor Temple, Adeptus Sororitas, and the coalition of Astartes chapters currently opposing the upstart Federation.

The Eversor folded, almost double as it cradled the heretic hating explosive, it's entire body quivering in ecstasy as it savored this special moment. Shivering and muttering a half-remembered prayer to the machine spirit, frantically imploring it to unleash ultimate devastation to those that may be standing too close to the door.

He primed the melta bomb and tossed it at the door. The distortion bands around the casing fused to the plasteel door at the molecular level. The assassin began to laugh at the top of it's lungs.

A large sphere of blinding light bloomed inside the darkened halls beneath the palace, a lone star that chased away the darkness. Moth eaten tapestries devoted to the ruinous powers instantly combusted under the tremendous amounts of radiated heat, mouldering paint blackened and peeled off walls.

The moment the star collapsed, the Eversor vaulted through the partially collapsed, slagged doors, landing on the bank of the molten puddle on the other side.

"Emperor preserve me."

The walls and ceiling was covered in pulsating tumorous organic matter. Fleshy fronds ending in lamprey maws writhed and twisted, sallow reptillian eyes bulged and rolled, puckered gangrenous orifices gaped and released noxious red-brown plumes. Then there were the bodies.

Hundreds of human shapes were fused to the hall's corrupted surfaces, the holy form of man was displayed in various states of mutation and distortion. Many wore the same black and white robes as the heretic he played with earlier, some wore the brown coats and bronze plate of a palace armsman, others were adorned in the lavish trappings of nobility, the rest were too changed to even identify. But all were still living, their lips moving in unison, a chorus of dry whispering voices.

"_Malice"_

_ "Malice"_

_ "Malice"_

_ "Malice"_

The Eversor forced his attention off the choir of the damned. He scanned the room, Executioner Pistol held in an iron grip in front of him, omni-scope panning left and right atop the mast.

"So contemptible," a slick oily voice uttered from the shadows, "After hounding my steps to this world, the Inquisition sends not one of their own, but a glorified attack dog to lead me to slaughter."

CIXIV's bloodshot eyes searched impatiently for the miserable arch-heretic that spawned this abomination.

"I wonder if your simple mind can comprehend the majesty of this sacred place. You who stumble in the dark, fumbling in ignorance, incapable of grasping true enlightenment. My ally lord Malal has shown me the true path to victory against the Great Enemy, and I will not have my work undone by a base creature such as yourself."

The Eversor was barely listening at this point. Whatever reasoning this heretic used to excuse his actions was irrelevant, nobody was exempt from the consequences of sin. This filth may as well be arguing his points to the executioners axe. But the manner of his communication did make CIXIV ponder, the assassin suspected that his quarry was a witch of some caliber which complicated matters. CIXIV was accustomed with slaying psykers, they would occasionally be employed by his targets as a means to thwart their own termination. Even the weakest and least talented witch could be a menace to the unsuspecting, or worse a potential bridge to the dread inhabitants of the Immaterium, Chaos daemons. The best remedy to their ilk was to kill them as quickly as possible.

"Retinue; remove this assassin in the name of the Emperor!"

They came from the shadows, it took the assassin but a few instants to gain the measure of the opposition. They were not the cultists that now covered the walls, their structure was far more flamboyant. He saw a heavily augmented individual clad in the traditional red kamino of the Adeptus Mechanicus, a large man who had the bearing of a Ministorum preacher but brandished a double-handed chain sword, an oversized abhuman brute wielding a double barreled auto-cannon, a woman bedecked in Sororitas pattern power armor with a meltagun, and many other outlandish combatants.

CIXIV did not wait to let them attack first. The assassin instead thrusted his pelvis out, canted his head back and unleashed a bestial scream of pure orgasmic murderlust.

_**"WRYYYYYY!" **_

Eversor assassins are reputed for their speed, most could run at bursts in excess of 70 KPH. CIXIV flew at the retinue at 82 KPH. A storm of gunfire lashed out to meet him, he fired back at the immediate threats with his bolt pistol, his clawed hand raised high. The autocannon toting abhuman was the first to die, two Hellfire bolts to the chest and the creature dropped to the ground as mutagenic acid payloads liquified his lungs and heart.

CIXIV jinked to the side as a searing melta stream swept towards him, fired by the 'sister'. The Eversor assassin gracefully dipped out of her field of fire and finally closed with the retinue. The pistol was holstered and replaced by the buzzing single-edged power sword.

Agents of the Eversor Temple are not quiet killers by any means. They are Apocalypse bound to human flesh, conceived for the special few that have angered the Imperium. To those whose indiscretions have warranted an Eversor pride should be taken, not every heretic is worthy of such a gruesome visitation of Imperial retribution.

Ropes of bloodstained saliva hung from the jaw of the skull helmet as it articulated to mimic CIXIV's howls of hate/pain/joy. He danced like an epileptic amongst the mismatched heretics, neurons fired through his system like an assault cannon as he dipped, dodged, clawed and cleaved his way through their ranks. A stubber round buried itself in his shoulder, he flinched not from pain, but the hated feeling of amphetamines being spiked into his body. The bleeding was staunched immediately by hyper-coagulant, the synskin reformed over the wound.

Even as he slew, the Eversor assassin's thoughts whorled and twisted like a hurricane. The mind of an Imperial assassin, no matter what temple it belonged to, moved like an intricate and unstoppable clockwork machine, Eversor were no different. Since the moment his training began, CIXIV had not only learned how to kill, but was taught everything there was to know about the Imperium that would be his hunting ground. In between having his body ravaged by endless steroids and stimms there was a razor sharp mind, and even within the drug induced haze, this did not completely leave him. Whilst the bloodletting continued he was subconsciously drawing up the report he would be giving to his handler should he walk from this mission alive. And the report was shaping into something even _he _found disturbing.

A quartet of death cult assassins surrounded him, eight gleaming blades locking him inside a cage of steel as he fought off attacks on all sides. This reminded him of training, confined to a cell with blade equipped training-engines as his only company, the dried blood of the Eversor Temple's failures staining their dark metal chassis. The death cultists were fast, but he was faster. Like a blur he lashed out with his claw, the index tip scratching a female assassin's wrist. Within moments her blade dropped from nerveless fingers and dropped to her knees as the poison consumed her, she was swiftly beheaded by an opportunistic flick of CIXIV's power sword. Moments later he knocked aside a male assassin's guard and stuck his claws into the lesser killer's shoulder dragging him close; he died when the Eversor's teeth tore out his throat. The spicy taste of death cultist blood was like heaven to his augmetic taste buds, but he reminded himself that these were the foulest of heretics so he quickly spat it out and activated the washers built into his metal jaw, the bitter flavor of purifying chemicals struck his pallate. The death cultists faltered at the sight of pink foam suddenly pouring out of CIXIV's mouth, making him appear like an obscene rabid beast.

_**"PRAY TO YOUR GODS!" **_The assassin bellowed, skewering a third assassin on his claw, crushing her heart. The last assassin, the leader if the red cowl was any suggestion pressed the attack, his keen blades seeking to end the life of the creature that slew his brethren. But it was futile, despite his senior rank the gap in ability was simply too profound. The power sword cast a glittering arc as it met the two blades with such force that they shattered in the death cultist's grasp. A ceramite armored boot slammed up into the fork of his legs, forcing him to double over. Before he could move a felt a prick on the base of his neck. The death cultist tried to shout. He could not. His throat.

He felt his throat sealing shut, even as his nerves burned and bunched inside his flesh.

The death cultist curled into a fetal position from the cocktail of lethal toxins that had been injected into his spinal cord. Confident that the poison would finish the job, the Eversor turned his attention to liquidating what remained of the retinue.

The priest armed with the giant chainsword rushed him muttering heretical oaths, CIXIV casually sidestepped the slow attack, grabbed the apostate by the neck and crushed his larynx. He then twisted and threw the corpse at the sister as she fired the melta again. He rushed a group of men who may once have been Imperial soldiers, but their uniforms were blacked out on one side, in keeping with the cult's blasphemous fashion statement. He cut them down with a single sweeping stroke as he passed into their midst. Sister was the only one left now.

He covered the distance between them in a single leap, knocking the melta out of her grasp with a backhand and pinning her to the floor. She struggled as he raised his neurogauntlet, and brought it down. She cried out as the claws penetrated the articulation point in her hip and commuted the essence of death into her veins.

"W-what?" She gasped, "Emperor, have mercy what have I- what-" she broke off as the searing pains began. The Eversor ignored her and got to his feet and walked towards the end of the writhing hall.

* * *

The warp spawned blasphemies became denser further in. Was any redemption possible for a world harboring such a nest of evil? It went without question that after this was over this planet would come under harsh Inquisitorial scrutiny. Inquisition... suddenly everything clicked.

The assassin sprinted forwards, weaving through the corrupted growths and dodging errant tentacles. His heart hammered at a rate that would kill a normal human, his teeth gnashed behind his mask as his wrath deepened.

He came to a stop when he reached the end of the hall. The arch-heretic was standing in a glowing ritual circle, surrounded by eleven freshly gutted corpses, the Eversor noted that one of them matched the description of his original target. The machine spirit inhabiting his suit acknowledged the heretics death and 'rewarded' CIXIV with a massive dose of celebratory opiates, his Temple's equivalent of a pat on the head. But the rush felt hollow to him, too premature in light of this new heresy.

The heretic was large, bulky, most likely wearing power armor, he had his back turned to him and the cloak he wore obscured most of his figure. The assassin did not hesitate. CIXIV burst from hiding and dashed straight at the heretic at blinding speed, he waited until the last moment to activate his power sword and aimed it at his back where he judged the heart would be.

And then he vanished. It was like time had stopped and the ruinous powers edited the heretic out of that last, adrenalin fueled second. The Eversor had only a moment to process the feeling of pure incredulity before he was seized by an unnatural force. CIXIV screamed with impotent fury as his boots lifted off the floor, and an invisible hand tightened it's grip on his body.

"Your kind is pathetically predictable Eversor," the haughty voice said mockingly, "Like a moth to the flame."

He was turned about in the air until he faced his newly appointed target.

CIXIV enjoyed those brief moments when the target was confirmed. It meant that his mission would soon be complete. To the Eversor, a primary that still drew breath was like an itch that could not be scratched, the longer the target lived the more he suffered, it brought him indescribable joy whenever he served the death blow, it felt as if the Emperor himself was smiling down on him. But to have his quarry in reach, and be unable to strike...

It was torture.

The target wore a set of gloss black power armor, the paint on the left side had been scraped off to reveal the gray metal beneath, set into the center of the chest the stylized tri-barred 'I' of the Inquisition was visible, his face was obscured by a silver embroidered hood. The heretic was an Inquisitor.

The Officio Assassinorum was only rarely called in to terminate a renegade Inquisitor, the deeply secretive Ordos preferred to use their respective militant arms to take care of loose ends, as it was impossible to secure the Officio's service without getting the Adeptus Terra involved. It only happened when all other options had been eliminated. CIXIV had never killed an Inquisitor before.

The Inquisitor stepped forward, he had a curved ceremonial knife in one hand made of yellowish metal. CIXIV could not stop a maniacal grin from spreading across his mangled face. The fool intended to take his life as a sacrifice, which was perfect. Like all other Eversors CIXIV had a special organ stuffed in his ribcage, a small lumpen thing the size of a child's thumb called a Terminus Gland. When his body sustained terminal damage, the organ would rupture and spill a reactive substance that would endow his bodily fluids with acidic and combustible properties, resulting in an explosive reaction. His dying mortal shell would turn into a deadly firebomb that would ensure he got the last laugh. Not all servants of the Emperor got to die so fashionably.

_'BlooddeathfiremurdermaimstabtearburnEmperorglorytothedoomofthepraiseHimonTerravictoryindeathand-'_

"We are not so different you and I," the heretical Inquisitor said icily.

_'Murderforsaintsandprimar- what?' _The Eversor's giddy anticipation for it's own explosive demise fell flat as the blasphemer started speaking.

"Both of us uplifted from the ashes of our origins to serve a flawed Imperium..." the man continued.

The Eversor's confusion turned to frustrated realization, _'Emperor's grace, he is monologuing.'_

"But where you were raised to be a thoughtless bureaucratic tool, I was burdened with the impossible task of saving Mankind from the madness of Chaos."

CIXIV's muscles contracted beneath the synskin as his mounting rage induced rippling seizures throughout his body. The Imperial Assassin fervently wished he could simply will himself to explode, such a thing would be a blessing compared to listening to the self-important fool ramble on about his fall into corruption. This was not the first time a Primary had tried to engage a monologue with him, normally CIXIV killed these idiots before they finished the first sentence, this time he had to endure the whole thing.

"... first loyalty is to the Emperor, last to myself. If I must entreat with foul powers to satisfy the mandate of the Ordo Malleus, I will gladly..."

The man really loved the sound of his voice. Or perhaps, it was because CIXIV had already massacred everything in the general area, and the heretic had no one else to talk to. The Assassin instead tried to imagine what he would look like exploding; a blistering fireball propelling his vaporized molecules, blackened twisted bionics, and smoldering slivers of synskin and charred wargear in all directions mixed in with the burning flesh and shattered bones of the Primary, it's death scream of shock and horror lost amidst the thunderous report of his last service to the God-Emperor. It would be beautiful.

"... only you could imagine it. Chaos turning on itself and guttering out forever! Humanity's victory would be complete and nothing would..."

At this point, CIXIV's mind was a boiling cauldron of murderous desire, even more so than usual. Every cell in his body screamed for the heretic's blood, the debased fool had him on a platter and he would just not shut up!

"... mentor would not believe me, even my retinue thought I had gone mad! But I can be very persuasive, another advantage of being a psyker. In the end victory is achieved, and at so little cost. I may be a heretic in your eyes but history will remember me as a..."

_'Makeitstopmakeitstopmakeitstopmakeitstopshutupshutupshutupshutup!'_

At this rate, CIXIV would not need the Terminus Gland to self-destruct, every single muscle in his body was in constant strain trying to free himself from the psychokinetic confinement, needles forced pure adrenalin into his body intensifying the blazing agony that wracked his mortal shell. The Inquisitor's damnable voice lowered in pitch and he spoke ever more slowly.

"...heeeeerrrrroooo, aaaaannnnnd viiiiissssiiioooonnnaaarrry. Iiii shhhaaallll mmmaaaake thheee Iiiiimmpeeerriuuummm grrrreaat aaagaaaiiin!"

CIXIV swore an oath that if he left this place alive, he would cannibalize every egotistical windbag in the galaxy, that is if his handlers would let him. The heretic's voice dropped further, sounding more like upset bowel movements than a long-winded prepared speech.

The assassin's vision flashed and blurred as more chemicals flooded his body, and pumped out again by the extractor to be recycled and the process begun anew. His grasp on reality was slipping and he was maintaining extra effort to keep his last active aggression inhibitor from deactivating, which would reduce him to a mindless husk beyond the Officio's ability to control. He would be hunted and put down like a sick animal. Although that was not much of an issue given his current predicament, old habits died hard.

"Buuuuuutt Iii haaaaavee sssspoookeennn looooooonnnng ennnooouughhh! Iiiit iiisss tiiiimmme fffooorrrr yooooouu tooo beeee puuuuuut doooowwwwwnnnn!" That had CIXIV perking up immediately. Finally the filthy heretic was done with it's worthless lip flapping!

The Eversor watched as the golden knife was raised, towards it's neck. So the traitor sought to slit his throat? CIXIV was bored already, he had been hoping that the heretical Inquisitor would wildly stab him all over the place, to really make him feel it. But it seemed the man's appetites for death were just as flavorless as his speech, CIXIV was extremely disappointed. But still it was a moot point, the moment when his blood ignited within his flesh would more than make up for it, and at long last he would be standing at the Emperor's side.

He felt the knife cut through the synskin, and slice his jugular open, eliciting a bright carotid spray as his life blood was evacuated.

_'Peaceatlastpeaceatlastpeaceatlastboomboomboomtherewillbenothingleftofme! PRAISE-THE GOD-EMPEROR!'_

"Praaaiiissseee..." he gurgled, blood sluicing out through his mask's mouth.

The Inquisitor's triumph and CIXIV's bliss was then interrupted.

"Ave Deus-Imperator!" A feminine shout quaked through the assassin's ears, and his eyes focused on a figure that had appeared behind the Inquisitor. The heretic bellowed in rage and pain as a screaming Eviscerator chainsword plunged through his back and out his belly, held in the trembling grip of the battle sister CIXIV dispatched earlier. How she was capable of standing through the hard dose of toxins he did not know, but the golden glow surrounding her may have been responsible.

The sister's Emperor-given interjection caused the Inquisitor to accidentally release the assassin. CIXIV fell to his knees and in an instant, hyper-coagulants had already stemmed the flow of blood from his neck, and replacement fluids streamed into his body.

"NO! YOU FOOLS! THE WARP WILL CLAIM US ALL!" The heretic bellowed in a voice that were it transcribed to paper in Low-Gothic, it would likely appear in all capital letters. But CIXIV wasn't really in the mind to listen, the amount of drugs in his system was extreme even by his temple's standards, it completely precluded any reasoning.

The Neurogauntlet flashed and punched through the Inquisitor's jaw with enough force to shatter it, throwing free the hood as it penetrated the tongue, sinus, esophagus, pallete, skull, brain, and out through the temple. Half the man's face bore heavy chemical burns, and his black hair was bleached on that side as well. CIXIV snarled twisting his claws violently, so as to crush that man's face beyond recognition.

Although the celebratory narcotics did not come this time, CIXIV felt intoxicating degrees of relief and joy as the Primary's vitals ceased permanently. His eyes then focused upon the battle sister, she had sunk to her knees and was shaking. Obviously that glowing phenomenon had done something to hamper the efficacy of the poisons that he had injected her with, which shocked him quite frankly. If left alone she could possibly pull through the toxin's effects, he placed her odds in the field of three to ten. He was contemplating whether to finish her off or leave her for the Inquisition to work over, but his attention backslid to his surroundings when he noticed the room began to bend around him, and the air crackle as the circle of runes flashed an angry red. Reality was falling apart right before his eyes as the barrier between two realms evaporated.

CIXIV roared when his feet left the ground for a second time as the laws of physics took their leave. A spherical warp rift formed above, and the assassin, the sister, the Inquisitor's corpse, and everything else was sucked into the mad embrace of the Immaterium.

* * *

The assassin did not pass into the realm of Chaos quietly. Even as he fell into a world of discord he lashed out blindly with sword and claw at all perceived threats. His eyes were closed, he could not open them no matter how hard he tried. Chitters, roars, screams, and moans came at all directions and distances at once, unmentionable things caressed him even as he blindly cleaved away their foul appendages.

For any normal man, a trip to the Warp meant certain damnation, the mind torn apart and the soul devoured by eldritch horrors. CIXIV's mind had been broken countless times since he first began his service to the Imperium, broken and remade stronger than before. He would not give the daemons the satisfaction of unmaking him without a fight. But with his body so jumped up on stimulants and combat drugs, the sheer sensation of being in the Warp was quickly overwhelming him.

Despite his defiance, or maybe because of, the howls of the warp things grew louder and more excited. He refused to succumb however, even though his handlers were far beyond reach he still had his commitment to the God-Emperor to urge his refusal. He was prepared to die fighting. But that was not what happened.

The assassin suddenly felt himself flying. Not battered by convulsing currents but hurling into a linear trajectory he vaguely registered as 'up'. The Eversor felt his body fall at ease as he flew through the Warp like a deathstrike missile, leaving the roars and bellows of the daemons behind. The assassin was not concerned, for him this was the culmination of everything the Eversor Temple had taught him since the beginning. He had completed his duty, and his faithful service was being rewarded. This could only be the Emperor calling his loyal killing machine to stand at his side at the Battle at the End of Time. And for the first time in a long time he allowed himself to feel true happiness.

His eyes opened behind the mask. The HUD icons blared inconclusive readings and warning runes as it's machine spirit tried and failed to make sense of what was being seen. He was tumbling through a tunnel of dancing lights around a field of black, bouncing against invisible walls and flashing as they caromed in alternating directions. Was he falling down a rabbit hole? Would he be allowed to kill the rabbits? String their ears together and present them to the God-Emperor as tribute?

He saw light at the end of the tunnel, and his vision grew darker. _'Mission... successful.' _The Eversor assassin blacked out just as he crossed the threshold.

* * *

Millie Vaughn was just a typical home-schooled autistic nine-year-old girl, she spent most of her time at her mother's Gotham City apartment and did not have any friends. Millie had a routine she rarely deviated from, she woke up every day at nine in the morning, infallibly ate the same brand of honey nut cheerios for breakfast, watched reruns and recordings of Ed, Edd, and Eddie in the noon, spent the afternoon in her room playing with her toys, and after eating the same spaghetti and meatballs dinner she's had for the last two years she spends the next few hours being tutored by her mom until going to bed precisely at eight in the evening.

Deep down Millie wanted to try something new, maybe meet kids her own age and possibly befriend them. But that would mean breaking her routine for the day, which unsettled her, so she would put it off for the next day or even the next week. She wished that friends and other exciting things would come to her, and she would often spend hours fantasizing various scenarios that were infinitely more interesting than reality.

The only person who she actually interacted with was her mom. Millie really liked mom, but sadly she was not that much of a conversation partner. Mom did not understand that Ed, Edd, and Eddie was the coolest thing ever, she would ignore her every time she tried to tell her every funny thing that happened in today's episode, it was like she did not even care. Why did she not love Ed, Edd, and Eddie?

It was currently two o'clock and Millie was as usual inside her room, sitting cross-legged on the floor facing a neatly arranged row of stuffed animals and other toys, lost in her own world. After a few minutes of silence the little girl sighed dreamily and a sudden thought came to her.

Putting her hands together in prayer, Millie spoke aloud, "God it's me again, I need a friend, someone who will not make fun of me. I want an angel, the nicest angel you have, amen."

The simple, childish prayer was answered by a loud crack coming from outside. Millie never heard a sound like it before. Her curiosity aroused the little girl left her room and headed towards the door that led out into the hall. Her apartment was on the ground floor so it was not a long walk to the double doors that led into a wide alley.

There just a few meters into the alley was a funny looking man lying on the ground wearing strange black clothes. Cautiously Millie ventured out into the alley to get a closer look, soon she was standing over the stranger, an expression of pure fascination formed on her face.

The stranger wore a silly looking skull mask with glowing red eyes, and the funny suit was actually armor, she also noticed a very large sword clenched tightly in it's right hand, and a pointy fingered glove on the left hand which had tubes running into it that connected to a pair of glass bottles filled with bright red fluid, it looked like fruit punch. All these things told her that this was a noble knight from a faraway land who has come to be her friend. Or maybe he really was an angel? She always got knights and angels confused.

"Hey angel! Wake up!" she called down to it. There was no response, aside from the random twitches of it's limbs and fingers.

Impatient, Millie proceeded to grab the angel by it's claw arm and drag it towards her apartment building.


	2. Angel of Destruction

**A/N: Sorry a little shorter than last chapter. Next one will have heavy violence. Notice the Dark Age of War reference.**

* * *

An Eversor assassin was not by any means 'lightweight' this one was eight-hundred forty-five pounds of biochemically enhanced muscle and bone, artificer grade cybernetics, armor, wargear, and enough combat drugs to kill a Carnifex. This mass combined with the speed they typically moved at allowed these assassins to flip over cars and smash through walls with mocking ease. Therefore there was no way a sixty-five pound nine-year-old girl should have been able to shift let alone drag one around like a dead raccoon. But that did not stop Millie.

The angel was sticky, red stuff got all over her wherever she touched him, was it some kind of tomato sauce? Did this mean he liked spaghetti and meatballs like she did? Curious she paused to wipe a bit off the angel's shoulder with her finger and put it on her tongue for a taste. It had a bitter metallic flavor, she cringed and spat it out, really bad tomato sauce.

She dragged him into the building, uncaring of the dark red track marks his body left on the commercial grade carpet. He was very heavy, and it took several minutes for her to successfully bring him all the way to her apartment. By the time she dragged his twitching body into her bedroom she was exhausted.

Plopping down on her bed, she frowned at all the sticky spaghetti sauce that now covered her clothes and hands, she wondered if the angel swam in the stuff before God sent him to her. She noticed something dangling from his pointy glove thing, gingerly she reached between the shiny metal digits that were clumped with meat and tufts of what looked like hair, she retrieved a fleshy string attached to a small ball, it looked like an eye, but that could not be right, eyes are supposed to be in heads, not hands. Maybe he used the pointy glove to eat? It looked like it could shovel a lot of spaghetti. Perhaps he was a messy eater, that would explain why he was covered in sauce.

"I wonder what kind of dreams angels have."

* * *

He was fighting. Surrounded on all sides by enemies.

Eversor assassins just like him.

"I am His favorite!" One shrieked.

"Correction: I am!" Another interjected.

CIXIV had never encountered a fellow Eversor before, let alone a teeming mob of them, so all of this confused him, but the matter of contention did not.

"I am the Emperor's most favored!" CIXIV screamed, hacking the first assassin's skull masked head in twain with the power sword.

"I have inflicted more casualties!" Another assassin shouted, kicking CIXIV in the back.

"Abaddon is my next target! Yours is a lowly false prophet!" Another sneered, stomping on CIXIV's head.

CIXIV ripped out a bestial snarl and grabbed the offending leg with his neurogauntlet, twisting it and rolling to his feet whilst swinging his howling counterpart in a wide arc, batting a few other assassins back.

"I will always be his foremost servant!" CIXIV claimed hotly as he unloaded his bolter into his improvised bludgeon and then the other assassins. Some went down, but strangely did not explode as they should have. More rushed in to replace them.

"I'm His favorite!"

"No, I am!"

"Go to sleep again!"

"I am His chosen weapon!"

CIXIV tried to fight back, his arm fell off at the elbow fending off two strikes too many at once, claws raked into his back, a bolter round detonated in his kneecap.

He was forced to the ground, dozens of Eversors dog piling on top of him, forcing him into submission.

"N-no! You can't I'm the... the..." CIXIV hissed as he tried to squeeze out the words as more and more Eversors threw their weight on him.

* * *

He awoke, heart hammering in his chest as it rode out an extra-large dose of amphetamine automatically delivered in response to his unconscious state.

Muscles clenched, he was in pain, he was dry. The extractor had sifted most of the performance chemicals from his veins, to be separated, recycled, held in reserve; until the next fight.

He could feel the normal 'housekeeping' drugs sliding through his veins, fortifying, immunizing. But they were cold, and did not bring him any joy. They fought an endless battle against the toxins, venoms, nerve agents, acids, and viruses that swarmed through his body. If it were not for the neutralizing elixirs and dissolving compounds, his body would explode like a plasma grenade.

Slowly his eyes opened, admitting the faint red light of the heads up display to shine upon his dark pupils. He sat upright with an almost mechanical lurch, festering eyes hungrily devoured every detail of his surroundings.

He was in a room, approximately fourteen-feet-three-inches by twelve-feet. Powder blue wallpaper, peeling. One window, white dressings, mildly soiled. One door, reconstituted wood construction, minimal durability. Bed, single. Toys, numerous, in rows. Dresser, five drawers...

"Angel, you're awake!"

At the shrill voice, the assassin was on his feet inside a second, weapons bared for murder. He glared down at the sole other occupant of the room. Smiling up at him even as his Sentinel Array's machine spirit marked down her vital points on his HUD.

The target's genemarkers pressed into his head inside a heartbeat. Human-female-minor-short-pale-healthy-blonde-human-female-minor-praise the Emperor.

Threat Analysis: Insignificant.

It was trying to communicate. It's dialect was not one CIXIV immediately recognized. It mattered little, he had little desire to interact with anything that failed to trigger a murder-response. Immediately detaching himself from the child's pestering, the Eversor assassin sluggishly made his way towards the door. His shivering fingers were inches from the knob before the _insignificant _female tertiary interposed herself between him and the door. The needles lining his back clicked.

She was speaking again, more forcefully. Demanding his attention, which was really the last thing any sane Imperial citizen should be asking for. Eversors were not known for having forgiving natures. He flexed the neurogauntlet, one nervous impulse, and the child would die.

Suddenly she threw her tiny arms around his waist, taking CIXIV by surprise. It was not a hostile attack, she was just... holding on to him. The assassin studied human social behavior extensively during his training and while he boasted a professorial degree of knowledge in the subject he had zero first-hand experience. He recognized this minor's action as a bonding tradition common amongst members of a family unit; a hug to be precise.

CIXIV had never been hugged before.

He pondered over how he should react. Curiosity battled against his deep seated tendency to kill _anything _that occupied his mental scope for more than a few seconds.

Curiosity won out. He had no outstanding mission parameters at the moment. Looking back at his knowledge he recalled the proper response to the 'hug' ritual.

* * *

A few minutes later, after Millie had regained consciousness after nearly being crushed to death by the thankfully weakened Imperial assassin, she showed her guest around the apartment.

CIXIV figured this was some kind of hab-shelter, but he noted some inconsistencies. He knew from personal experience of tearing into many such dwellings that each had a few things in common in regard to décor. Any respectable household would at least have a small devotional shrine to the God-Emperor, ritually consecrated every so often by a local preacher. So far, he had yet to see even a single aquila.

There was also the examples of technology present. Moving through the kitchen he inspected the various appliances, turning them over and pulling them apart, much to the distress of the child. There were no Mechanicus fabrication seals, or even Administratum tax codes. Which was impossible. Everything about this hab screamed Not-Imperial. Which concerned him.

After thoroughly wrecking the kitchen, Millie coaxed him into the living room.

The shaking was getting worse. He wordlessly took a seat upon the abnormally soft couch when the girl gestured to it, the fragile construction creaked and snapped under his weight. He cared not, he was so entirely focused on restraining himself.

He was supposed to be standing at the Emperor's side! But the Father of Mankind apparently had other plans, and now he was far from the designated mission area. Eversor assassins were not meant to function outside a mission agenda, they were supposed to be put in stasis _immediately _after an operation was completed. It was the only way they could be as they are and still be beloved by the Imperium. He was _created _to be a living, breathing death threat to all holders of power, he had nothing else to define his existence.

He needed a goal. A target, to guide him. Without one, he was nothing more than a selfish greedy monster. He had no right to take a life for his own sake.

_'Better to die for the Emperor than to live for oneself.' _

The Eversor creed was clear; under no circumstances should he be allowed to descend into a rogue state. This was a matter of honor. A point where righteous mass-execution simply becomes a self-centered killing spree.

He checked his infusion reserves. Enough for one week. Standard mission supplement. He would run out of Frenzon a little sooner, got a little too needle-happy murdering every living thing in the palace; in hindsight he probably could have left the cockroach infestation alone, but the _Dictatus Eversor_ was absolute on that point; Contingency Protocol 21-Nu: _everything _must die.

He could probably double that time if he avoided combat as much as possible. But that in itself was a problem. CIXIV was not in the least bit ashamed to admit that he loved killing, one might say he was addicted to it as much as the drugs he depended on to survive. But CIXIV was also pious and endlessly loyal to the Imperium that created him, if the Emperor asked it of him he would burn with a smile. And if he could do that, than surely he could wait until the Officio's agents tracked him down and put him in stasis where he belonged; right?

"Uh, Mister Angel?"

The assassin trained his crazy red stare on the girl.

_'Crush-burn-maim-destroy-the-unbelievers-kill-and-attack-and-burn-and-ignite-and-stab-repeat-praise be His name.'_

He wanted to hug her again, only harder this time. Unaware of the dangerous swing the 'angel's' mind had just taken, the girl stepped forward.

_'Hugshugshugshugs.' _His arms twitched.

Still ignorant of the kindling psychochemical maelstrom, she unwisely drew further of the Eversor's attention. The assassin had begun to understand her however, he had come to realize that this was no Gothic dialect she spoke, but rather something very similar to the 'Terran Basic' used by the Ancients, and his understanding of that language was scratchy at best. He was typically sent to massacre people that spoke that tongue, not converse with them.

A thought hit him. Could he be on a Federation controlled world?

Unlikely. Technology was too simple.

"You wanna' watch some TV?"

* * *

The vid-screen was... primitive. Imperial holovids were works of cinematic art combined with carefully embedded propaganda and subliminal messaging. The Administratum was very generous to the indoctrinated masses, and vid-reels of state-sponsored content could be found just about anywhere in the Imperium. However it was the fact that this child had such technology in her home made him feel disconcerted.

The Adeptus Mechanicus would never entrust such a machine to the care of plebian hands, therefore such devices were only to be found in media centers located in hablocks, tended to lay priests of the Mechanicus. Private ownership was therefore found mostly in the aristocratic elite. The assassin had watched vids before, but only during his training in the Eversor temple. The vid-reels they showed him were unlike the revised garbage doled out to the faceless masses, vids that showed how the Imperium _really _functioned, and just how broken humanity was as a species, what with so many turning to sin and going unpunished for it. It made his blood boil fiercely just thinking about it, he did after all exist solely to offset the weight of heresy on mankind's soul.

What the vid-screen showed was neither. Instead it featured three abhumans with oversized discolored tongues, with an unhealthy fixation on hard candies the size of Medusa siege artillery warheads. One wore strange headgear and acted in a manner similar to a Vanus fledgling prior to emotional repression therapy; another had jaundiced skin and had the intelligence and behavior akin to a terminal Obscura addict; the shortest one was mostly bald and acted in an avaricious manner that the assassin normally associated to targets that needed to die in fittingly anticlimactic ways. The child seemed to hold this bizzare production with a zeal that in the Imperium was normally reserved for Ministorum telecasts, and shows like _Attack Run _and _Cain's Heroes_.

In his vaguely lucid state, the assassin was not endeared in the slightest to such an asinine form of entertainment. But it did distract him from his wild urge to indulge in child killing. Instead of watching the vid-screen the assassin rolled out a clean black canopy on the floor and disengaged the neurogauntlet from his left arm. Setting the terrible murder-tool on the matt he drew out his Executioner pistol and held it at the ready as he proceeded to expertly clean the neurogauntlet with one hand, paying extra attention to the tube connection ports behind the knuckles, and the intricate transfer manifolds linked to the two transparent toxin ampules; their slightly viscous life destroying contents sloshed with his attentions.

The Eversor Neurogauntlet was a master-crafted weapon that had been in service with the Temple since Sire Eversor – the foremost of psychotic killers in his age – established the Officio Assassinorum alongside the other 'clades' – to use the archaic parlance of the time. The first versions of this weapon were little more than plasteel needles, comparatively brittle and not very efficient for it's intended purpose. The latest model deployed for use in the waking decade of the 42nd Millennium was made of Type II Hyperalloy, with a design inspired by genestealer rending claws. The clawed digits possessed molecular self-sharpening edges that were easily capable of slicing through reinforced bulkheads and heavy armor plating. The claws hosted thousands of micropores that constantly exuded the Temple's signature elixir of distilled hypertoxins, replacing the archaic hypodermic tips and ensuring that even if the initial strike did not sever the cords of life, the target would still most certainly die a horrible death all the same.

After removing the last clumps of envenomed human meat which were all that remained of the renegade Inquisitor's face, he sprayed the weapon with a sterilizing solution.

_'Your wargear is essential to your service to the Emperor. Give unto it the respect you will never give unto His enemies.'_

The powersword was laid down on the canopy. An Imperial power weapon was generally accepted as a symbol of rank, marking an individual of either great worth or great wealth. They were often lavishly decorated with embellishments of precious metals. Nos so for the butchery tools employed by the Eversor Temple; it's muted dark grey adamantium finish was unadorned save for the traditional marks of his order and simplistic in design. Imperial Assassin's were by nature the humblest of all the Emperor's servants, their was simply no room in their narrow mindsets for gaudy trappings of ego and prestige.

The Executioner bolt pistol was another masterpiece. It was essentially a sawed off version of an Astartes grade bolt gun, given it's muzzle velocity was twice that of a common bolt pistol, and had a fully automatic and burstfire setting in addition to semi-automatic. It was also a combi-weapon, incorporating a fiendishly lethal needle gun underneath the .75 caliber barrel.

As the assassin finished the rites of maintenance, the bizzare show on the vid-screen cut out, eliciting a cry of frustration from Millie and a disinterested snort from the Eversor. Seconds later the screen came back on, and a loathsome face was plastered on it.

It was a man, possibly in his early thirties, one side of his face handsome and debonaire, the other half bore gruesome chemical burns, he wore a suit bi-colored black and white. Visions of the heretical Inquisitor immediately shot through his adrenal duct boosted brain. A familiar, welcome rage swelled within his twin hearts.

"Good afternoon Gotham City, I am Two-Face former DA and victim of fateful happenstance," the disfigured heretic spoke, "I am broadcasting live for the trial of Gotham City's greatest offenders."

The camera panned to focus on two men tied up behind a wooden desk, the word 'Defendants' scrawled into the face.

"Mayor Quincy Sharpe, and my successor in the DA's office Darren Quimby. You have been charged with criminal negligence to the true state of this city, how do you plead?"

The DA glowered at him, "I'm not playing your game you twisted son of a bitch."

Two-Face paused, and flipped a tiny metal disk before catching it, "In absence of a plea, you are declared guilty in absentia. Let's move on to the sentencing."

The heretic opened his hand, revealing the disk, it's face scarred. "Not your lucky day."

A glazed look entered the heretic's eyes as he swiftly pulled out a handgun and unloaded two shots, Darren Quimby collapsed, bullet holes in his throat and forehead.

"Oh my God!" Quincy cried, recoiling from the corpse that fell face down on the desk next to him, coloring it's work surface with a widening pool of red. "Please sir! Have mercy, I- I have connections I can pay you! J- just don't kill me!"

"It's not my decision," Two-Face replied, the coin flipped again. Glancing at the result, the heretic looked back at the screen. "The Mayor's bail is set at twenty-two million dollars in cash, if it does not arrive within two hours time, the sentencing will proceed as planned. And in case you are wondering, this bail also covers the twenty _other _accessories to these men's crimes I have detained that must _also_ stand trial. Have a nice day."

There was silence, the Eversor assassin was mute as his mind turned inside a maelstrom of violence. Words flashed on his HUD.

_-Transmission traced. Position marked.-_

"Thank you Emperor," the assassin whispered. The needles pushed in, his blood turned to fire. "For leaving me work to do."

A tap of Hyperfrenzon entered his body.

"Angel, are you-" Millie began.

CIXIV leaned towards her and screamed in her face at maximum volume. _**"FATA ET SANGUIS EX INFERIS!"**_

In a blink of an eye, the assassin was no longer on the couch, a loud crash and the entire building shook. Millie looked up from where she took cover to see a large rubble-strewn hole in the wall roughly shaped like a man.

"Angel?"


	3. The Nightmare Begins

Ferris Cunth really loved being an ice cream vendor. He had the satisfaction of running his own business as well as choosing his own hours, and then there was the children. His weathered Ford Econoline ice cream truck drew them out like moths to the flame with it's merry jingle; black, white, hispanic they all rushed out clutching bills and loose change hurriedly doled out by their parents.

His career may not have payed all that much, but then he was not in it for the money. He was in it for the excitement, and nothing excited him more than seeing all those young faces crowding his sale window, so eager, hungry, expecting.

Ferris Cunth was in fact a serial child rapist known to Gotham as 'Pedobear' who was linked to twenty-two cases of sexual assault and homicide against minors for the last five years. He was named such for his habit of carrying out these crimes wearing nothing but a bearskin cloak and leaving bite marks all over the bodies.

Being an ice cream vendor allowed him to scout out his 'lovers' up close without drawing suspicion. Nobody thought ill of the Ice Cream Man.

Today he was looking for number twenty-three, and he was after something special. For the past few years his motivations for carrying out these heinous crimes had less and less to do with sexual urges and more to do with the thrill of breaking taboo and getting away with it, as well as the notoriety he had acclaimed. Before his pedophiliac crusade Ferris had been a nobody, and now after five years of evading justice he felt like an untouchable bad ass. Batman could not stop him, the Police most certainly could not stop him, he was invincible.

For the past two weeks he had gone down this particular street, serving the same blissfully ignorant children, all to scope out the one girl that did not come out to see him, a highly elusive item called Millie Abigail Vaughn.

He had first seen her by chance two weeks ago when her mother brought her out of the apartment and escorted her to a car. Pale blond hair, albino complexion, large crystal blue eyes, awkward posture indicative of a social pariah. It was like catching a glimpse of a rare animal that one only sees once in a life time, or never. He had been immediately captivated; and from that day he vowed to make her his.

From what he could determine the abduction should be straightforward. The mother left Millie unattended for a sizable portion of the day, giving him a wide window in which to carry out his plan of action. Ferris dedicated a lot of time to planning his assaults, and he never 'courted' his victims the same way twice, each plan was tailored exactly to the target to minimize the risk of being foiled by the authorities. Millie would be no exception.

As he turned down the road that would take him by Millie's apartment building he turned on the music. The iconic _Do Your Ears Hang Low? _Blared forth from the PA speaker mounted on the raised cab.

For whatever reason, the magnetic effect of his ice cream truck failed to draw out his latest mark. He did not think it was possible for a child _not _to like ice cream.

As he came upon the beige colored apartment building he began feeling a tingle of foreboding crawling up his spine.

Suddenly, something struck the windshield with a wet splat. Startled, Ferris squawked like a pre-pubescent baboon as he floored the break petal so hard that his refrigerator shifted several inches forward in the back. Heart hammering, he took a closer look at the hideous object currently defiling his windshield. A large fracture, amidst a spatter which was unmistakably blood was clearly visible – as was the mutilated body of what was once possibly a squirrel.

The child rapist spat out a string of curses. This was no doubt the doing of some brat in need of some disciplining.

He angrily shoved the gear shift to park and turned off the engine. He looked back to the store area and looked hungrily at the piles of well used and slightly bloodied rope, cartons of extra-small condoms (that were still a bit too big for him), and trophies – mostly in the form of clothing – taken from his victims. He hoped this little shit was under fifteen.

Exiting the vehicle, Ferris gazed around the immediate vicinity. "Alright, where the hell are you?!"

He was answered by another flying rodent corpse hitting him in the shoulder, defiling his white clothing with thick bloodstains.

"FUCKER!" Ferris cursed, wheeling around to see _someone _duck around the corner of the nearby alley.

_'Oh no you don't.' _Ferris snarled mentally.

Brimming with wrath, he stormed over to the alley and turned the corner to find... a hole in the wall.

At the far end of the apartment building there was a hole vaguely shaped like a man, with rubble and debris scattered on the ground outside.

Disturbed, Ferris hurried back to his truck and got back inside. Breathing hard, he fished into his pocket and extracted a carton of cigarettes. Eager to work off his stress with the absence of juvenile company, he stuck one between his lips as he fumbled with the lighter. Finally he started the flame and lit the end. He sucked in a long drag and sighed with relief.

'_SCHLUCK!'_

A piercing pain erupted inside his gut and back, Ferris felt something warm trickle down his belly. The corrupt mobile retailer looked down dumbly to behold a large single-edged blade protruding from his belly just above the navel, inserted at such an angle he could see the words 'Sic Semper Traitoris' etched into the cold, bloody metal. The blade twisted and Ferris finally gasped, the lit cigarrete was sucked in and became lodged in his throat, the burning ember pressed against his sinuses. Desperately he fumbled with the blade sticking out of him, six fingers from both hands fell to the floor, severed simply by touching the impossibly sharp edge. Lungs screamed for air, bloody stumps of truncated digits began raking at his throat, he wished so much to scream.

His gag-reflex kicked in, he bucked as the abdominal contraction caused the blade to cut deeper. As his stomach contents came up, a strong muscular hand sheathed in black came around the chair and chopped below his Adam's Apple; by reflex he inhaled. An unpleasant gurgling sound followed by burning pain in the chest ensued as his vomit aspirated through his windpipe and settled into the lungs. And the cigarette was still stuck.

Tears filled his eyes as another hand, this one augmeted with glinting claws moved with the first to caress his paling face.

_'Oh fuck...' _was his last thought before CIXIV began to squeeze. A loud sound – shockingly similar to a ripe head of cabbage being bitten into – filled the truck as Ferris Cunth's skull collapsed in a spurt of blood, brains, and cerebrospinal fluid.

The body slumped. CIXIV pulled his inactive power sword out of the seat and it's deceased occupant. As he moved to police the body, CIXIV noticed something sticking out of the intact lower part of the skull. Fishing it out, he examined the slightly damp cigarette. After a moment of pondering the assassin placed the cancer stick between the teeth of his mask, and snatched the lighter on the dash. A flame flickered, a long drag, smoke billowed from the stomatic respiratory cavities on either side of his neck.

"Praise the Emperor."

* * *

The Twin Cities Bank was once a promising venture started in the early twentieth century, combining assets between the Loughton Bank in Gotham and the Pioneer Bank in Bludhaven. It's life was short however, when the Great Depression fell upon America, the Twin Cities Bank closed it's doors and never opened them again. Today it was just another run down carcass littering the urban blight of Old Gotham.

From the roof, one could gaze across the river to behold Blackgate Prison standing as a solitary sentinel, further beyond that rose the towering sky scrapers and gothic architecture of Midtown Gotham. The building was supposed to be abandoned.

Twelve armed men were loitering inside the trash strewn lobby, their stance relaxed and weapons held with the exaggerated care of those who payed for their own armaments.

"You think the Bat is gonna crash in on us?" A young inexperienced thug asked him comrades.

"Possibly," one replied, "Focus on the job rookie, and don't let that freak scare you, it's not like he kills people or anything, he's a soft touch."

"Well I'm not," a burly guard retorted, "If he shows his face here, I'm givin' him a Kennedy crewcut." He racked the slide on his shotgun for emphasis.

* * *

The Econoline's engine roared as it shifted into higher gear. The skull faced driver was hunched over the wheel, gazing hungrily out the cracked windshield as the wipers skimmed thick crimson droplets from the surface, dry red streaks marred the glass.

_'Forward-tunnel-around!-around!-left-right-accelerate! Praise the God-Emperor!'_

* * *

"Yeah, fuck that guy," one of the older criminals spat, "Him and all his other spandex butt-buddies."

Half the room's occupants muttered in agreement.

"Hey you really think the boss is going to kill off more people?" The burly guard asked, "The DA may have been a self-righteous prick an' all, but he didn't need to be offed like that."

"Didn't you just say you were gonna blow the Bat away?" the young one asked.

"The Bat has had it coming for a long time, killing him will build serious cred. But blasting a district attorney just makes life difficult."

"Oh, he's serious all right," the old thug inserted, "The boss may be smart, but he is completely crazy- makin' all of his decisions with that damn coin of his; without it he is as useful as a dick flavored lollypop."

"Are you serious?" The young guard spluttered.

"Shit-face is as nutty as they come." the man affirmed.

* * *

Rubber tires skidded as the ice cream truck skidded through a red light, charging straight through right merging traffic as it catapulted through the intersection. A trio of vehicles bearing red and blue flashing lights followed it through, their sirens wailing.

* * *

"If he is so unreliable, why bother running errands with him?" the rookie asked.

"It's like the lottery kid," a waspish man answered, "Whenever Harv get's his shit together it means a big payday for all of us, you just have to know when to bail out."

"Is it that time yet?" he nervously asked.

The man took a slow drag from a joint, "Almost."

* * *

The Eversor slammed into another sharp turn, the Econoline fishtailed as it drifted into a perpendicular entrance ramp, ignoring the red 'Wrong Way' signs completely he sped up at full speed. Two cars careened off the ramp as their panicked drivers took evasive maneuvers.

* * *

The rookie was about to reply to that when he heard a mysterious song in the distance, a piano jingle that transported everyone in the room to their early youth.

"Hey, you guys think the Boss will mind if we pick up some ice cream?" the burly guard asked.

Before anyone could answer, the ice cream truck swerved into view of the lobby window, and it was coming in fast. It was not until the retail vehicle cleared the parking lot and rolled onto the raised sidewalk in front of the doors did they start running for cover.

The ice cream truck smashed through the entrance doors, into the foyer, and through another set of doors into the lobby.

CIXIV flew out through the shattered windshield like a flying fish. Recovering with a roll, the assassin executed a dramatic pelvic thrust before his stunned audience. The supercharger connected to his respiratory system cycled up to saturate his muscles with oxygen, as it did so it stimulated the Eversor's vocal cords, making him involuntarily unleash the feared murder cry of his order.

_**"WRYYYYYY!"**_

Rookie cried out and shot at the intruder, the Eversor was on him inside of a second. The neurogauntlet gored the young man through the eyes, the assassin's boot kicked the body away but the head stayed with the assassin. CIXIV pitched the gruesome trophy like a professional dodgeball champ at the closest target, the severed head struck him in the temple with enough force to kill instantly.

Burly unloaded his shotgun into the assassin, the buckshot completely failed to penetrate even the synskin, making CIXIV feel as if he was being pelted with gravel. Abandoning the gun in disgust, he charged the assassin and wrapped his meaty hands around the killer cyborg's neck. CIXIV batted the arms away with enough force to break them, he grabbed Burly by the neck and shoulder and pulled outward. Burly screamed as his skin broke, his breastbone snapped, ribs gave out one after another. Muscle and sinew stretched and parted, intestines gushed forth from a widening gap. Within three seconds Burly's body had been split right down to the pelvis.

The lobby echoed with the horrified screams of men who knew they were going to die horribly. The Eversor showed them no mercy as he cut them down. The old thug tried to shield himself from the crackling power sword as it matched coordinates with his head. Funny thing about power weapons, Imperial media tends to show them cutting cleanly and cauterizing the wound; in reality, power weapons made an even bigger mess than a chainsword. The old man's body rippled open like an overfilled water skin, as the disruptive field literally _tore _him asunder, blood splashed all over the floor, and the assassin.

Waspy cried out as the Eversor seized him by the leg and proceeded to swing him in wide arcs like a cat in a Monty Python movie. Suddenly he was released and sent flying towards the skylight. Waspy smashed through and flew higher still over the roof and towards the parking lot. Through his one good eye that did not have a shard of glass stuck in it, he saw the Earth approaching rapidly, Waspy knew there was only one thing left to say.

"I accept Jesus Christ as my personal lord and savior!" he screamed at the top of his lungs just before every bone in his puny body snapped on the filthy pavement outside the Twin Cities Bank. "So cold..." he whimpered as he died.

Back inside the bank; with the lobby clear, the assassin sprinted towards the nearest wall.

* * *

Having heard the ruckus in the lobby, the three henchmen in the loan office had their guns aimed at the door that lead to the waiting area, ready to blast anyone that tried to open it. Their precautions were for naught howerver.

The wall to the left of them exploded inward as the skull masked spree slayer busted through the wood and drywall.

_**"OH-YEAAAH!**_

The closest thug scarcely had time to scream before his upper section was separated from the lower and his torso fell to the floor on top of his own shattered viscera.

The second tried to bring his shotgun to bear on the assailant, but a clawed hand was in an instant jammed into his shoulder and dragged him close, the shotgun was pried from his numbing fingers and raised overhead. The man screamed but was suddenly unable to when the barrel entered his mouth, his neck snapped when the scatter gun was tilted vertical and rammed down his esophagus. He was still alive when the assassin pulled the trigger. The man's pelvis exploded outward, and his ruptured intestines flowed out of the hole and onto the floor like bloody sausages. He spasmed a few times before dying.

The last thug in the room dropped his gun and backed away in sheer terror. "P-please don't kill me! J-just take me in, I won't do th-this kind of stuff again!"

Not kill? It hated not killing! Work was too beautiful to stop now. How about punish? He had been beaten within an inch of his life when he did wrong, before he was complete. Yes this was perfect!

"I judge you guilty of dissent against the Lex Imperialis, the punishment is flogging."

"W-what?"

The assassin seized the thug and threw him onto the loan desk, before he could slide off he found himself pinned by the claw. The man continued begging as the Eversor tore off his coat and shirt, and then began screaming in agony as CIXIV's blunt fingers began pushing into the small of his back. He then heard a sound similar to a lobster dinner being cracked for consumption as his spine was messily ripped out.

_'WHACK!'_

The thug screeched in agony as the bloody segmented length of his own spinal column connected between his shivering shoulder blades.

"This doesn't..."

_'WHACK!'_

"...seem..."

_'WHACK!'_

"...physically..."

_'WHACK!'_

"...POSSIBLE!" the man screamed incredulously.

_**'CRUNCH!'**_

* * *

Hearing the commotion, Two Face left the manager's office with his twin .22 semi-automatic pistols in hand. Cowering behind him were a pair of former adult film stars known by stage names Sodom and Gomorrah, twin sisters whose overindulgent lifestyles ruined their careers. In exchange for being his arm candy, Two Face financially supported their sins of excess.

He could hear the sounds of his gang being massacred amidst the heinously out of place drone of _Do Your Ears Hang Low? _He had decided to make a break for it, and his bitches had elected to come with him.

"You'll protect us, right Harv?" Sodom asked.

"Be quiet," Two Face growled, "Can't let em hear us."

"You mean him?" Asked Gomorrah, pointing forwards.

Standing at the end of the workroom was a frighteningly large figure clad in a matte black bodysuit and armor plating. The face was concealed by a morbidly grinning skull mask with glowing red orbs burning in it's sockets. Worst of all was the vicious gore soaked claws that beweaponed it's left hand, the large sword sheathed on it's back, and the enormous 'cannon' holstered to it's right thigh. The figure was completely drenched head to boots in blood.

"Who the fuck are you?!" Two Face shouted, "What do you want?!"

"Hugs." The skull faced horror trilled obscenely as it stepped forward.

"Stay back!"

"Hugs!" the monster growled.

"We warn you!" Sodom challenged.

"We know tai-chi!" Gomorrah finished.

They looked back to Two Face for emotional support only to see him running back down the hall towards the office.

"Dent you fucking bastard!" Gomorrah cried hysterically.

The Eversor flew across the room, mouth agape, arms wide open.

_**"HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGSSSSSSSS!"**_the madman roared with delight as he fell upon the fleeing bimbos.

Sodom and Gomorrah shrieked as two powerful arms seized them. The Imperial assassin crooned with joy as it squeezed both of them against his chest guard. Cries of hysterical protest quickly turned into bloodcurdling screams as the assassin began to squeeze harder. The twins struggled as they felt their ribs cracking, even as the Eversor affectionately nuzzled the back of their necks with it's horrid masked face. When their chests finally collapsed inward, blood exploded out of their mouths as their lungs popped and the light finally left their eyes. CIXIV released them and gazed lovingly at their broken bodies as they fell to the floor limp as a pair of boned fish. Their torsos had been crushed to half their original diameters.

* * *

The coin had told him to run. Run while the enthusiastic super-junky was busy hugging his female escorts to death. And of course he did not argue that decision. It was all up to fate. He retreated back into the manager's office where previously he had been making mad love to the now deceased Sodom and Gomorrah.

The scarred gangster quickly moved to barricade the door with a nearby bookshelf, as well as the dresser.

Just as he was about to move the desk, the door and the frame it was attached to was violently ripped out of the wall. The assassin shoved aside the furniture blocking it's path as it stepped into the room.

"You son of a bitch!" Two Face shouted as he unloaded his handguns into the pharmacological monstrosity. The Eversor, completely unaffected, strode through the gunfire.

"The verdict is the same," the assassin seethed, "You die by my hand; again."

Dent looked down at his guns in horror as they clacked empty. "No, no you don't understand..." he dropped the guns and fished out his prized double faced coin, one side clean the other defaced. "It was the coin... i-it made me do it, I could not ignore it!"

CIXIV stood still as the desperate criminal waved the coin in front of his face, before suddenly lunging his head forward and biting the coin and some of his fingers off.

"_NYARGHHH!_ You fucking animal! Give it back, I can't live without it!"

Unfortunately for Dent, the coin was already dissolving in the caustic pit of molecular acid that passed for the Eversor's stomach.

The assassin kneed Harvey in solar plexus, making him double over on the floor. CIXIV casually drew out the power sword and stabbed it into the floor. He then walked over to Two Face, grabbed him by the legs and dragged him towards the standing blade. Dent screamed bloody murder as his crotch got closer to the transparent monomolecular killing edge, he cried out a falsetto when he felt his balls being neatly bisected, and wailed as it cut even further with zero resistance. Soon CIXIV stood holding up both halves of Two Face like a pair of cold cuts. Not content with that, the assassin took the opportunity to further degrade and defile the Primary's corpse. The sounds of flesh being torn and bones being crushed echoed through the blood spattered building.

* * *

A few hours later, before the sun set to sink the city in a deeper setting of gloom, Gotham Police are at the Twin Cities Bank. The crime scene unit was going over the building with a fine tooth comb, searching for any evidence they could find between the blood, offal, and body parts. Detective Harvey Bullock the head of the Major Crimes desk was overseeing the investigation. Commissioner James Gordon walked through a sea of flashing red and blue lights as he entered the crime scene.

"Whatcha got Harvey?" The commissioner asked without preamble.

"Constipation," the detective answered, "Never shoulda eaten all that pizza last night."

"I mean the crime scene, wise ass."

"Near as I can see, Dent and his gang got a bit antsy, then partied a little too hard while waitin' for the ransom money."

"You really expect me to accept that?"

"Nah, commish'," admits Bullock, "Be nice if that were the case."

"So what happened here?"

"My best guess?" Bullock coughed into his sleeve, "I'd say after bein' too late to stop Dent from doing his thing, Bats felt tired of humorin' him for all these years and decided to opt for a more permanent solution."

"You actually think Batman did this, _THIS?!"_ The commissioner gesticulated to the four dozen bloodstained body bags arrayed in rows on the parking lot.

"Hey, all I'm sayin' is that anyone who dresses like a bat clearly got some issues."

"I'll keep that in mind. What about the ice cream truck?"

"That's anotha' sticky spot," Bullock admitted, "It appears that we finally caught the infamous Pedobear, all the evidence is in there; unfortunately someone squished his noggin and stuffed him into his own freezer – shame all those snacks being ruined."

"And the hostages?"

"Still trapped in the vault, we are cracking it open now." the detective answered.

"Good, blindfold them when they are lead out, they don't need to see... this."

"Will do chief," Bullock nodded.

"Have you found Dent?"

"Only part of his head, pretty sure the rest of him is in there somewhere... or everywhere."

"God, damn it. Get me some more suspects detective. Has the roof been cleared yet?"

"Yes, sir," Bullock replied.

"Good. I need a smoke. Let me know when you find something useful."

"I'll keep ya' informed Boss," the detective replied before heading over to the forensics team.

James Gordon ascends the stairs all the way to the rooftop access. Stepping out into the mildly warm air, he casually lit himself a smoke.

"Those things aren't good for you James," a gravelly voice pointed out from behind him.

"My wife says they will be the death of me," Gordon replied gravely, "And I keep telling her I'll quit."

"Have you?"

"I'll get around to it."

"You are aware I didn't do this," Batman stated.

"Obviously," Gordon replied amidst expelling a plume of smoke, "Bullock just wants to use you as a convenient scapegoat."

"Do you have any suspects?"

"Ones capable of inflicting this level of carnage?" Gordon asked, "No, this is the most bloody crime scene I have ever walked into, what we have here goes far beyond a simple grudge against Dent."

"Whoever the killer is he or she is obviously a metahuman of some kind, and likely on some serious drugs."

"What makes you figure that?" Gordon asked skeptically.

"The killer was capable of smashing through cinder block walls, and tearing one victim apart down the middle with their bare hands. And the sheer scale of the violence indicates a severely altered mental state, which would allude to heavy drug abuse."

"Have you found anything useful?"

"I've collected some samples, I will be running a full analysis in the Batcave. I don't believe they will turn anything up however. I think this particular vigilante is smart enough to employ forensic countermeasures."

"A vigilante?"

"That is my best theory. This attack appears to be completely reactionary. I will keep you informed."

* * *

Millie Vaughn was sitting miserably in her room. She missed the angel.

She had always wanted a friend like him, although he did not talk much she believed that they had a connection. Walking aimlessly through her wrecked, tomato sauce covered apartment she had waited anxiously for God's nicest angel to return.

A loud crash suddenly reported from outside her room.

Excited, Millie swung open the door and ran out of her room into the livingroom.

There, standing in front of another man-shaped hole in the wall made right next to the old one, was the angel. Disregarding the huge mess of debris, Millie cried out with joy as she ran over to him. Throwing her arms around his waist, she noted that he had more tomato sauce on him than ever, especially on his face where scraps of what appeared to be meat hung from the corners of his jaw.

CIXIV responded to her affection by reaching down and giving Millie yet another smothering near-death experience. As their air was forced from her lungs, Millie decided she didn't care. She had a tomato-sauce angel, and he was her best friend in the whole wide world.

* * *

**END OF THE FIRST DAY: 50 dead and 2 squirrels**


	4. Bloodshed Before Dawn

Early Summer on Crest Hill was typically accompanied by seasonable warmth and relatively clear weather. The air was fresh here, comfortably upwind of Gotham City's industrial pollution and urban blight, and carried the faint crisp scent of sea salt rising up from the cliffside overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. This made it a popular route for cyclists and fitness nuts who would travel up and down the looping road that connected to Midtown Gotham from the west and the upper middle-class suburbs to the south.

This landform hosted the estates of Gotham's wealthy elite, the largest and most well known of them was Wayne Manor, a stately complex of Gothic and castellated architecture situated close to the seaside crags to the east.

Billionaire playboy philanthropist Bruce Wayne was the last remaining heir to the Wayne family, following his parents tragic murder almost twenty years ago. In the public eye he was just your normal man with far too much money, but in secret the reality was quite a bit more complex.

Underneath the estate was a network of caves, which served as the headquarters of the most feared (up until recently) vigilante in Gotham. Batman.

Batman was hard at work going over the crime scene photos he had taken at the Twin Cities Bank earlier that evening. The mosaic of screens connected to the Bat Computer were flooded with details on the crime. One of the screens had the mugshots of Harvey Dent and his unfortunate criminal and medical history on it. Another was a list of every member of his gang that had been killed today, or at least the ones that could be identified.

Bruce took a sip of lukewarm coffee from the batmug and set it down on the batcoaster.

The dark knight heard footsteps behind him and turned his head to see Alfred approaching, his face covered by a respirator, and his tailored suit concealed by a heavy grey poncho. In his hands he carried a tray with a fresh thermos of batcoffee resting upon it.

"Alfred?" Batman said, voice slightly slurred. "Why are you wearing that?"

"This cave is unsanitary," the butler calmly replied, "The bats and their... leavings have made this place unsuitable for human habitation."

"The bats are not the problem Alfred," Batman replied somewhat defensively.

"With respect master Bruce. The elevated methane levels are very much a cause for concern, it is only a matter of time before it becomes the death of us."

"Further investigation is needed..." Batman muttered as he stared back into the glowing batscreens of the batcomputer.

"Any progress on identifying this mystery hero?" Alfred asked.

"This is not a hero," Batman said, "He's a dangerous psychopath, and this is only the beginning."

"How are you so sure it is a 'he?' master Bruce?"

"The holes in the wall give a rough outline of the killer's size and build, he is at least seven feet tall and likely weighs more than a quarter ton. He is also fast, very fast."

"How can a chap so large move around quickly?" Alfred inquired further, setting the tray on the batdesk.

"Look at these photos," Batman answered. Images of corpses flooded the scene, savaged and barely recognizable, "The shell casings are gathered all around the bodies, bullet holes all over the lobby. Whoever did this hit them so quickly they never had the chance to escape."

"Good Lord..." Alfred said, staring at the scenes of carnage, "What manner of monster are we dealing with?"

"The killer used a variety of methods to murder Harvey Dent and his gang. Some of the victims died to acute toxicity, claws coated with an incredibly potent form of neurotoxin, the deadliest I have ever encountered. We are dealing with a professional."

Looking again at the extensive list of bodily mutilations on the autopsy reports, Alfred sighed. "Master Bruce, I make no slight to your capabilities; but I believe you should reconsider confronting this madman. He could very well be the death of you."

"I have drawn the line, innocent or guilty I am bound to protect everyone in this city. I will not cross that line, and neither shall anyone else." Batman gritted out, standing up from the batchair. "Cancel Bruce Wayne's appointments for the day Alfred, this is far more important."

* * *

CIXIV had always enjoyed the simplicity of his existence. There was no need to question, no call to doubt, and no excuse to hesitate – there was only the will of the Emperor. He felt no regrets for the loss of his humanity, mourned not for the flesh that was taken, questioned not the cybernetics given; it was worth it – all of it.

He had never before felt so lost.

The kitchen was no longer in the same mess he had left it in; the dismantled components of multiple appliances that littered the vinyl covered floor had been joined by the discarded contents of the refrigerator. The insane cocktail of drugs masquerading as a living being was now scrunched up inside the vacated food storage device, knees tucked into chest with both arms and shaking like a Quaker.

_'Primary eliminated go to sleep-rest-and-recover-and-hibernate-praise the God-Emperor.' _the assassin's pious soul cried out for the cold embrace of the stasis crypt. When a Eversor assassin completed it's mission, the creature would be irresistibly drawn to a pre-planned extraction point where a retrieval pod would be waiting for it, the assassin would instinctively place itself inside to be immediately sedated by the machinery within; an Officio recovery team would then take possession of the pod and the assassin.

CIXIV had been deployed hundreds of times, and on each occasion there had been an extraction plan, he would be pumped with enough macrotranquilizers to euthanize a space marine and awaken again inside a drop pod falling towards a different world for a different Primary for the same purpose. Seven years of endless butchery spread out over the course of a millennium.

And now, when this constant factor in his life had been disrupted, he felt only frenzied desperation.

"Angel? Why are you in the fridge?"

He looked up and focused on her. Listened to her heartbeat and perceived her stress. Ran chemical analysis and knew how she would taste. A dozen bookmarked killpoints flashed through his mind. But the will to eliminate her did not arise – yet.

"Eversor Dictum #1196. Following successful completion of objectives, unit must proceed to extraction zone and deactivate for retrieval." CIXIV responded mechanically.

"You are tired?" She asked.

"Negative. Blood sugar levels are automatically maintained at optimum levels, lactic recovery rate instantaneous. I cannot be stopped."

He could not go to sleep unassisted either. The same chemicals that kept him alive induced severe chronic insomnia, and the adrenal ducts in his brain further prohibited him from entering deep sleep without a special drug that was now beyond his reach.

"You can't go to bed?"

"Affirmative," he hissed.

Millie was about to respond when a knock came at the door. CIXIV immediately uncoiled himself from the fridge and stood alert. _Emperor... thank you for this distraction._

The assassin made a beeline for the apartment door. Instead of turning the knob, the Eversor thrust his fingers into the gap between the door and frame, and then simply tore it off the hinges. Standing in front of him, a diminutive 5'5 to his 7'6 was a female adolecent.

"Hi, Sara! This is my friend! He's an angel!" Millie called out from behind the towering cyborg. Millie's babysitter stood transfixed in absolute shock as she gazed upon brutality incarnate. Eyes widening as it reached out to her with a claw that made Freddy Krueger look like a total pansy. She ripped out a scream of mortal terror and began running down the hall for the exit.

_'Pursue and subjugate!' _The God-Emperor snapped in his brain.

Not missing a beat, the assassin bounded into the hall in pursuit. Due to having dialed down his infusion settings, the assassin was relatively more sluggish than usual. His black sabatons crashed on the floor under the weight of his bionics as he built up momentum. The girl on the other hand was sprinting as if her life depended on it... which it kind of did.

_'Run-run-run-catch-and-maim-and-interrogate! Praise the God-Emperor.' _The voice in the assassin's chemical-besotted brain screamed at maximum volume.

_'Twin-heads-one-eye-prettybirdprettybird-catch-and-hug-and-incapacitate! PRAISE!'_

"Somebody help me!" Sara screamed at the top of her lungs.

A door further down the hall opened and a grouchy old man stepped out, "What in the hell is this noise abou-?" He was silenced by a frantic teenager rushing by him, followed by a black blur that struck him a glancing blow, spraying everything around him bright red. He looked down dumbly to see his intestines spooling out of his abdomen like an unwinding garden hose, clutched in the grasp of the girl's pursuer. He collapsed dead as a doornail seconds later.

Sara pushed the doors open and stumbled into the alley, she did not spare a moment to look behind her as she raced towards the street. Not thinking to look both ways, Sara made a break for the other side. She did not see the bus coming.

* * *

**Beginning of the Second Day**

CIXIV stood on the rooftop of the apartment building, eyes trained upon the night sky. His advanced optics easily pierced the ambient light pollution of the city to reveal the stars hanging overhead. What he saw troubled him.

He knew these stars.

The assassin focused on one collection, together they resembled a man. _Oron._

Another that vaguely resembled an archer. _Saggitary._

A line of stars that reminded him of a serpent. _Drakho._

Every assassin knew these hallowed constellations. There was only one place in the entire Imperium where one could view these heavenly bodies from such a perfect angle.

Holy Terra.

But that was impossible.

His augmented eyes fixed upon the bright moon overhead. The Luna he remembered was a civilized world in it's own right with a population of seventeen-billion souls, this celestial imposter was frighteningly bare of any urban growth, there was nothing up there. The void stations, the starforts, planetary defense platforms, and Battlefleet Solar – everything that should have been, was gone. How does the largest and most heavily fortified orbital defense grid in the galaxy just vanish?

And there was this planet itself, which was presumably the Cradle of Mankind. Terra was an ecumenopolis, its entire surface blistered with towering hive spires that went as high as the exosphere. The horizon was completely occluded by urban mega-structures plated in gold, and the skies were thick with heavy smog (although the Terran Restoration Project was slowly changing that). Not so for this world.

Gotham City slightly resembled the common industrial urban landscape that was often found on Imperial civilized worlds, it almost reminded him of the outskirting urban zones of Scintilla's Hive cities.

"Can you see the stars angel?" Millie asked next to him, "I can't see any." The tertiary obviously lacked ocular filters to pierce the light pollution generated by the cityscape.

"Affirmative..." the assassin rasped.

"Do think Sara is okay?"

CIXIV recalled the earlier image of the adolescent female being thrown several feet, her body landing in a heap, resting in an unnatural angle, blood on the asphalt.

"Negative." the bluntness of the reply caused the girl to look down and pull her knees closer to her chest – obviously troubled. "I hope she will get better..."

Choosing not the respond, CIXIV reached down and wrapped an arm around her waist before jumping off the roof. Millie gasped in shock as the sensation of freefall hit her, before the assassin's boots hit the pavement, legs bending and back bowing to absorb the force of the fall.

Entering the hab via assassin-shaped hole in the wall, CIXIV set Millie down in the living room and promptly turned to leave.

"Wait! Angel, where are you going?!" Millie cried out, distraught at the idea of him leaving again.

"Must... punish... sin. Not much time left. Praisepraisepraise..." he answered cryptically.

"Don't go!" but it was already too late, CIXIV was out the hole in an eyeblink and once more on the hunt.

* * *

On the other side of the street, a pair of eyes glimpsed a shadow peeling away from the early morning darkness.

"The target has left the apartment," he spoke into a device fixed to his coat's lapel.

_"And the objective?"_

"All alone."

_"Splendid. Do I need to remind you what to do next?" _the voice asked, narcissistic condescension dripping through the line.

"No need, I have everything under control." the man answered. With one last look at the building, he immediately set to work.

* * *

After leaving the guano encrusted rodent hole called the Batcave, Pennyworth Alfred slipped out of the slightly defiled poncho and air can, revealing the finely pressed tailored suit and bow-tie beneath, leaving them just inside the area immediately after the secret entrance behind the study's antique grandfather clock.

He saw Richard Grayson, ward of Bruce Wayne and apprentice to Batman working at a small cloth covered table covered in tiny figures, along with several small plastic pots of paint in various colors and shades.

"Any luck?" the Boy Wonder asked without looking up.

"Sadly, no. Master Bruce is very... attached to his furry friends," the aged butler answered sadly, "If the problem is not taken care of soon, it may begin to take a serious toll on his health."

"He claims to have built up a resistance to the methane, I don't believe him," Richard agreed, "And I am tired of holding my breath down there."

"He is not one to admit when we have a pest problem, especially when said pest is the totem he has chosen to identify himself with, he cannot bring himself to get rid of them."

"He has always been stubborn," Richard responded crossly, "He still doesn't take me seriously when I talk about joining the Justice League."

"He is right to hesitate Master Richard, the League's work is dangerous."

Richard muttered something under his breath as he turned his attention back to his current task.

"A new hobby, Master Richard?" Alfred inquired.

"Painting my Warmachine army. I am planning to take it to an match next month."

"Warmachine?"

"A tabletop war game. I play Protectorate of Menoth, an country of religious extremists."

"So this game setting is rather grim I take it?" Alfred observed.

"I cannot imagine a universe more bleak than this one."

* * *

It was rare when Roxanne "Roxy Rocket" Sutton felt fear – let alone the unbridled terror which now possessed her. Roxanne was formerly a stunt double for a Hollywood actress. Her employment was terminated after she deliberately tried to make her stunts so dangerous that no company would dare insure her. Unemployed, but not lacking in thirst for ever greater thrills, Sutton descended into a life of thievery, primarily stealing jewels for the Penguin. She did not have a rap sheet nearly as colorful as other criminals in Gotham. She was always the only one at risk. Batman was a risk taker as well, as evidenced by his death defying attempts to catch her in epic aerial chases, it had gotten to the point where she developed a serious crush on the caped crusader. But alas, instead of returning her affections she was tossed to the tender mercies of Arkham Asylum. On the bright side, the chases were _still _fun.

Now she was being chased again. And this time fun was the furthest thing from her mind. She was running for her life.

It was horror that preceded the terror initially. She had entered a jewelery store from an alley entrance for some quick cash, only to find that some other hooligans had the same idea. They were all dead. Bodies carved to pieces, some literally beaten into an unrecognizable pulp, the scent of voided bowels and spilled blood corrupted the air. Then she saw the eyes, those horrible red eyes set into a leering skull, towering over her upon a body that seemed to blend in with the shadows. Then it stepped towards her...

Roxanne had bolted out the door shrieking bloody murder and made a dash for her rocket parked nearby. She hopped onto the rocket and turned the ignition causing the combustion chamber to flare to life and a tail of exhaust to flare out the nozzle. She immediately floored the accelerator...

… only to come to a sudden stop.

Roxanne's head struck the dashboard hard. Dazed she felt a strong hand grasp her by the back of the neck. The monstrous killer had seized the rocket with it's clawed hand, effortlessly holding her signature vehicle in place even as his other hoisted her up like a prize-winning trout.

Then he slammed her to the ground.

Roxanne cried out as her face was planted into the filthy alley pavement with enough force to jar five teeth out of her head.

He picked her up again, holding her up in line to the glowing nozzle at the back of her rocket.

"Noh... noh!" the criminal cried, realizing his intention.

Roxanne Sutton died screaming as the Eversor forced her face into the searing jetwash like a Catachan hotdog; her flesh peeled, blackened, and melted from her still shrieking skull. Not every tertiary got to experience the sensation of their cerebral fluids boil within the confines of their cranium. Roxy was one of the lucky heretics. Her vital signs ceased after ten seconds.

* * *

Half an hour later, police cars were stationed on the street outside the alley. Commissioner Gordon pulled up just as the EMT's were preparing to load a tarp covered stretcher into the back of an ambulance.

Getting out of his car, Gordon walked over to them.

"Dead?" he asked bluntly.

Not saying anything the EMT pulled back the top of the tarp, revealing a skull decorated with a mosaic of raw red skin, charred flesh, and the molten remains of a latex cap.

The commissioner scrunched his face as he took in the aroma of burnt human meat and he took an involuntary step back. "As you were."

Walking past he found Harvey Bullock standing in the alley.

"What's the latest?" He asked.

"Indigestion," Inspector Bullock responded, "Those Carolina Reapers are serious business, had to go through a whole tub of icecream to make it better... did I mention that I am lactose intolerant?"

"I am becoming bullshit intolerant, now sell it to me straight."

"Ralph Winger and his crew were found in pieces by the shop manager, we found Sutton here while securing the scene, someone set her head on fire."

"And her rocket?" Gordon inquired.

"Gone."

* * *

Returning to his temporary base on his hijacked rocket, CIXIV flew into the alley and through one of the holes in the living room, incinerating a large patch of carpet as he turned off the gas. Dismounting he awaited the tertiary's squeal of joy at his return.

Nothing came.

The Eversor fired up the sentinel array with a mental impulse, scanning for signs of life and finding none.

A high pitched beep coming from Millie's room immediately put him on guard, having not heard it inside this premises. Drawing his bolt pistol out, CIXIV made for the flower sticker covered door. Twisting the knob he threw the door open.

CIXIV immediately had his face blasted with green and black confetti launched by an array of party poppers on the ceiling. This annoyance was immediately followed by an even greater one in the form of an arrogant voice.

_"Well, well, well. Look at you; big, bad, and too stupid to not fall into such a simple trap." _The Imperial assassin's gaze zeroed in on the source of the contemptuous commentary, he spotted a camera mounted on a tripod, with a flat screen fixed to the legs with an image of a man wearing a green suit and hat adorned with question marks.

"Identify yourself!" CIXIV hissed.

_"I am your intellectual superior, I am everything that you can never strive to be, I am the greatest mind in the world. But for the sake of labels you may call me the Riddler."_

The assassin growled in response.

_"Such eloquence, it almost makes me feel sorry for the failure I am about to impose on you. You see I have been watching you, ever since the Twin Cities Bank, I have seen your disorderly rampages and listened to your maddened bleating as you carved through one obstacle after another. And in that time I have seen you for what you are; despite your obvious physical power, you are nothing more than a misguided animal that is at a loss as to what to do with itself, it is quite sad really." _

The assassin ripped out a hateful snarl.

_"Oh, have I bruised your sacred feelings? Shame on me, I am such a horrible, horrible person!" _he cried out in false dismay, _"But that is not the worst part. I have separated you from your only friend in the world."_

The image on the screen panned left and centered on a very familiar face, tied to a chair with a gag wrapped over her mouth. Her eyes showed fear, anxiety, pleading. This scum had taken _his _tertiary captive.

_"Surprised?" _the camera image centered back on the Riddler, a self-satisfied smirk on his gangly face. _"You really should not leave children unattended."_

The assassin screamed in fury at the man behind the screen.

_"Throwing a tantrum will not avail you. This trial requires elegance and subtlety, traits that are laughably outside your ability. So, riddle me thi-"_

_**SMASH!**_

The camera and screen shattered under the unrelenting fists of the Eversor assassin, vox amplified howls carrying the Catechisms of Hate across downtown Gotham.

His handler had been compromised.

* * *

**AN/: Sorry for being late. Still fighting depression. Not sure if I did this chapter right. Also, Warmachine reference, hang me.**


	5. Code Breaker

Bright crimson optics gleamed in the light of a gloomy dawn, Sol's glorious rays dampened by the ever present layer of smog that hung over Gotham City. As synskin covered hands rose to rest on a ceramite chestplate the palms splayed atop one another in the rough representation of a cog. A short, unsettling snarl escaped from the blood spattered teeth of the mask as the assassin gazed deeply into the flickering green haptic display of the microcogitator.

The machine was normally contained within a protected compartment inside his backpack. It was not normally used but on occasions such as this it was necessary. Under no circumstances should an imperial assassin ever fail to eliminate a Primary save through being killed themselves. To that end the Eversor Temple had labored over the last ten millennium to prepare it's agents for any kind of target and situation. If this Riddler thought he could shield himself from the Emperor's wrath with his feeble machines, he was gravely mistaken.

A microcogitator was a fairly uncommon personal computing device, most commonly used by high ranking government and military officials, inquisitors, and even assassins. The template of these devices had been held back from production on Mars centuries after it's discovery and full translation, only being uprooted after an inquisitorial probe uncovered malfeasance in the upper ranks of the martian clergy. As a result, the design was leaked to forge worlds across the Imperium and the technology has been skyrocketing in popularity ever since.

CIXIV had only used it once before on the Federation occupied world of Myouza to track the quantum communication pulses being sent by a field commander inside a cloaked dropbase. To make a long story short; he found the dropbase, penetrated it's defenses, and gutted the vile deviant before narrowly escaping moments before a precision orbital strike from an enemy frigate flattened the area. A glorious victory for the God-Emperor.

Right now he was using it to pin down the network of the despicable heretek who had taken his _handler. _

It was rare for the Officio Assassinorum to be directly provoked by an untargeted party. The bowel loosening reputations the various temples had accrued over the last ten millennium had deterred all but those possessing extraordinary hubris and stupidity from daring to test it's mandate. Such morons were usually dealt with by the Ordo Sicarus in a manner similar to swatting a fly, it would not do for the Imperium's best and brightest to be distracted by such incautious vermin. If someone hindered an agent in the field, ally or not the assassin was under standing orders to dispose of them.

But first he had to find the idiotic warp shit.

To that end he had salvaged what he could from the wreckage of what used to be the Riddler's means of taunting him. The technology was ridiculously primitive, a far cry from the crystalline based systems used by the Imperium, it came in the form of metal circuitry laid down on silicon boards that were easily damaged. Fortunately his cogitator came with an omni-link, the long cord was capped with a small bulb that projected a medusas nest of fine scilia-like connectors that were capable of meshing into almost any kind of port. The link had assimilated the circuitry around the surviving key components. The assassin was under no illusions of resurrecting the corrupted machine spirit – he had been too thorough in dismantling the devices for that – but he could at least be directed to it's next of kin.

His prosthetic mandible clicked on it's hinge as the anticipation welled up in him. The screen began to display relevant information pertaining to the Primary's network devices, most important was how to communicate with them. It was the first step in discerning his target's location.

Eversor assassins are by nature expedient and easily prone to boredom. The worst thing one could possibly do with an Eversor is leave it idle, without constant mental and physical stimulation an Eversor would likely collapse into a feral uncontrolled rampage within ten minutes. This was the primary reason why they were kept in stasis most of the time.

Eversor assassins that reach the aptitude rank of Epsilon-Dan possessed markedly superior levels of patience. CIXIV's personaly record of doing absolutely squat was approximately thirty-four minutes and ten seconds, before he found himself blacking out and waking up covered in the remains of something or _someone._ Needless to say, CIXIV despised waiting. And distracted himself by meditation on methods of murder.

_'Subclavian artery, carotid artery... inefficient; sever brachiocephalic artery for greater mortality. Acute spinal trauma remains preferred method of elimination.' _In CIXIV's opinion there was little that was more satisfying than a heretic's face as it's supportive discs crumbled in his hands. Aside from drug highs of course.

'**Datamine Complete'**

The Eversor assassin looked with renewed interest at the stolen machine memories that had been reformatted on his cogitator. Sifting through the data he quickly narrowed down an IP address. The assassin shivered with excitement as his device started receiving returns from the source: a single device that was undoubtedly one amongst many in the Riddler's network. With a chitter of elation CIXIV secured his mobile device and swiftly mounted his stolen rocket-cycle.

* * *

The sun was peaking over the low-rise buildings in downtown Gotham. A pale blue town car rolled up to a parking space next to an innocuous apartment building.

Gina Vaughn let out a breath of relief as she pulled her key from the ignition. She felt a little guilty not coming home last night without calling her daughter, she hoped Sara was able to take care of her irrepressible _Mimi_. But now she was back and she would make it up to Millie, somehow.

Stepping into the alley she paused at the mess she beheld in it. There was a large scorch mark on the ground, and littering the area she counted seven bloody messes of what she assumed were once squirrels and larger mess with a green collar sticking out of it which looked frighteningly similar to what she had seen her neighbor's cat wearing. This was obviously the work of a local gang.

Her stomach turning she tiptoed up to the door to her apartment building and went inside.

"Oh my God..." the smell, it was like an open sewer. But worse was the blood.

A trail of crimson lead from the door, through the hall, and into a busted door in the distance which she knew was her apartment. And there was also the corpse of old Mr. Abernathy, the gaping rift in his torso colored the carpet around him red with dried blood.

Fear gripped her chest, which was quickly overridden by her instinctual need to protect her offspring.

_'No, no, no! Please, not my baby!'_

She stopped at the threshold, eyes blurring as she took in the sight of her home. It looked like every bad rock-band on the planet had stayed there over night – at the same time.

The furniture was overturned, blood covered the floor, walls, and ceiling. Three sizable, man-shaped holes defiled the south wall, and the stench of burnt fuel and fiber hung in the air. But worst of all was that her daughter was nowhere to be found.

She shakingly walked up to the splintered remains of the door that once stood at the entrance to Millie's room.

Everything was destroyed, blooded. The walls bore numerous claw marks and another man-shaped hole was in the wall facing her. She fell to her knees in front of it as grief overcame her.

_"Millliiie!"_

* * *

When dealing with hereteks, subtlety was key. CIXIV did not do that very often. The Eversor assassin was far more acclimated to massacring all obstacles in his way; but sadly an Imperial Assassin could not afford to be shackled to solely one mindset.

The Eversor Temple – from the very start of his training – had carefully nurtured a unique brand of low cunning alongside his phenomenal talent for violence; mostly in the form of convoluted puzzles. When confronted with an obstacle they could not simply smash through, an Eversor's first instinct was to evaluate said roadblock from every loose angle. The trick was subtlety.

"You will surrender your knowledge to _us_ heretic, _**or your existence is forfeit!" **_CIXIV snarled to the paling lowlife he held suspended over an industrial sized air-conditioning unit. The grill shielding the large, rapidly cycling fan blade had been violently removed, and the frightened man's balding scalp was just inches away from being messily beaten off.

The Eversor had found this man by tracing the IP address through the World Wide Web. The man was found working at the incriminating device, the Eversor had quickly snatched the man and brought him to this ideal setting for a confession.

"All right! All right! I will tell you everything!" The man pleaded, trying to squirm his noggin away from the blades.

The two-headed birdie in his head shrieked for blood. Not yet. Not yet.

**"Tell us where he is!"**

"I don't know where he is! B-but I have contacts, on my phone! One of them must know! I- it's in my back pocket."

His pocket, and phone was immediately torn from his pants. There were some beeps as the Eversor operated the touch screen and found said contacts. This would do.

"Y-you're gonna kill me aren't you?"

**"Correct."**

Then the assassin let go.

The man's scream of terror was cut off suddenly when the rotating fan blade snapped his neck upon impact. CIXIV leered in appreciation as he watched the body twist and break for a few seconds before the fan's motor was jammed by the heretic's puny, disgusting limbs; setting off a flare of sparks and a plume of black smoke before the broken fan finally stopped spinning.

* * *

Within the Riddler's secret lair of misapplied intelligence, six henchmen sat around doing literally fuck all. Clad in bright green leotards covered in question marks, these men were the laughing stock of Gotham's underworld. Possessed of low self-esteem and frequently bossed around by their narcissistic employer, they served as little more than a bunch of yes-men.

To add further insult to lunacy, the Riddler had them all legally change their names to Mark. When the Riddler wasn't berating them for breathing too much of the communal air, these pathetic wastes of human resource simply wandered around the lair like a colony of stoned penguins.

All six were at the moment watching a documentary about Billy Mays on the television.

"Ya think after this job, the boss will let us wear normal stuff?" The shortest of the Mark's asked.

"Nah," was the simple reply of Fat Mark, who was busy digging into a bucket of chicken as the documentary went on to comment on cross-sections of Billy's famous vocal chords.

"He will yell at us if he catches us talkin' about it," Tall Mark reminded nervously.

"And he will stop my medication!" Moist Mark wailed, legs crossing tightly as the thought of being left to the full mercy of his feeble bladder made him feel discomfort in the lower regions.

Slow Mark said nothing, his spectacularly feeble wits had precluded his ability to speak properly. The best he could do was to try – and fail – to not look like an ogryn with Downs.

"He yells at all of you but not at me," Black Mark grumbled, "It's reverse racism!" He cried, once more believing that every slight, both real and imagined, was derived from racial prejudice. (AN/ I am not racist, I just really hate people who act like this.)

Their bitching was suddenly interrupted when the television screen went black just as the documentary was going over the medicinal properties of Oxyclean. White bold letters in the upper left corner read NO SIGNAL.

Slow Mark covered his misshapen face with his hands as he weeped chokingly. While the others groaned in frustration.

"Something must be wrong with the antenna again, Black Mark go check on it." Short Mark said.

"Why me? Am I your slave or something? You don't own me cracker, you go do it."

"Just do it, Black. We all did it at some point or another."

Black Mark scowled, "Oh, I see how it is."

He gave a frustrated growl as he got up the couch and walked over to the exit, "All the white boys gangin' up on the minority, you may win this round but next time I-"

Black Mark's rant was halted abruptly when the instant he opened the door the sheared end of the satellite antenna's mounting lanced through his rib cage at lethal velocity. His lung crushed, he coughed out his last, spitting gore on the parabolic dish's weather stained surface as he collapsed. "Shiit..."

Exactly a nanosecond later, the Eversor bolted through the doorway, looking like the most pissed off motherfucker of all time, complete with freshly cleaned claw, unlimbered executioner pistol, and a frothing mouth.

_**"BLAWD FAH TEH GAWP-EMPRAH!"**_

Three explosive reports boomed in rapid succession. Fat Mark's boulder shaped belly blew up, spectacularly.

"Oh shit!" the four remaining Mark's shouted in unison, sounding both startled and somewhat indignant. Everything and everyone was now covered in fat, shredded guts, fat, cellulite, fat, fat, and undigested chicken and ding dongs.

The assassin became a formless blur as it flew towards the green clad victims. Short Mark scarcely had time to scream before both of his halves were propelled to opposite sides of the room. Tall Mark found his head smashed into coleslaw on the floor, while an instant later Slow Mark found that he had lost ownership of his spleen, and his head an instant later.

Moist Mark, inches away from soiling himself turned around and tried to run for the exit, only to find a bladed claw blocking him. Moist Mark felt his body freeze and relax as the assassin tugged the claw out of his chest, he looked up and beheld the monster that killed him already walking away just as the pain kicked in. CIXIV did not spare Moist Mark's writhing form a second glance as twin pools of red and yellow began to spread from the incontinent crony's dying shell.

* * *

Completely unaware of the fact that his clueless henchmen were being slaughtered, the Riddler was currently engaging in his secret dirty pleasure. Exhibitionism.

Standing in front of a long mirror, the gimmick obsessed villain was clad only in a black man bikini with a green question mark covering his notorious baby penis, and several clumps of faux body hair adhered to his pasty white chest.

Edward Nigma grinned wickedly as he admired his emasculate physique. "You are one sexy genius," he cooed in a depraved manner that would have made Slaanesh proud. "As impressive in form as you are in wit!"

He giggled as he felt himself harden to a length that was pleasing to large rodents, but insufficient for small whores. "Show me more."

Riddler turned on his Ipod player, and the steady sensual beat of Marvin Gaye's _Lets Get It On _filled his room, which elegantly served to cover the death screams of ever closer origin.

As he danced like a tremendous faggot, Edward felt nigh invincible. Having long accepted that he would never know the touch of a woman, he found that sexual narcissism was probably preferable. He was the most intelligent man in history, there wasn't a woman on Earth that was worthy of his perfection. Only he should have the honor and privilege of touching himself.

The cameras he had set up began to click as he twisted and gyrated like a cocain addict playing Dance Dance Revolution, horrifying images that would soon be added to a collection of selfies that was climbing up to sixteen gigs in drive space.

With an exaggerated flourish he snatched the front of his man bikini and tore it off, exposing himself with a Cheshire smile before an imaginary 'awed' crowd. His euphoria was cut off by the sound of alarms. Someone had entered his maze.

* * *

Unconcerned with the labyrinth before him, CIXIV quickly turned to the oldest and noblest of his temple's traditions. Breaking through obstacles.

His heavy body smashed through the wood and plaster board with consummate ease. All senses narrowed on tracking the unique stench of Axe Bodyspray to it's source.

_"NO! NO! NO! You are cheating! Do you have any idea how long I spent setting this death trap up!?" _the Riddler's voice boomed over the intercom.

* * *

Panting nervously like a beaten bitch in heat, the Riddler frantically began looking through the random books lying around for anything that would help him avert his emasculating demise. After remembering no one uses books anymore, he quickly put in a search on Wikipedia, where he found a detailed cross-section of Donald Trump's prostate and a summary of the fourth season of Battlestar Galactica. While both of these were awful and disgusting things, it came nowhere close to what this brutish thing was likely going to do to him.

As he was about to boot up an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 on Hulu there was a gentle knock on the door. And by gentle I mean thunderous. And by knock I mean kick.

The Riddler stared with mounting horror at the ghastly specter standing in the broken remains of his doorway, mood lighting glistened off what looked to be several coats of blood accumulated over a number of massacres.

He could not believe this was happening. Standing completely exposed before what had to be the most dangerous thing Gotham City has ever seen, and it did not even have to follow any provided clues.

"Y-you cheated..." he whimpered pathetically.

**"Where is she?" **it snarled.

"O-oh? You mean the Vaughn girl?" He flinched when the Eversor's claw spasmed in his direction, "Well you see um... possession can be an abstract term. I- I well I never thought you would find me and... well lets say I had other reasons for taking the girl beyond vexing you."

**"Where is she?" **the assassin repeated, taking a step closer, so that Nigma could practically feel the sweltering heat radiating from the assassin's rage fueled body.

"Fries!" the Riddler practically shrieked, "Victor Fries! He payed me to find someone with particular traits for some crazy experiment he is working on! I looked up the Vaughn kid's medical records and... she's never been sick... never! Her immune system is practically impenetrable!"

Now that he thought about it, CIXIV did recall Millie had once touched his neurogauntlet, such an act should have doomed her right then and there, yet she was completely unaffected. Even the general toxicity his body produced should have rendered her bedridden and dying after all the hugs he had shared with her. Yet her health stood firm.

"S-so will you... let me go?" Riddler asked, breaking the assassin from his musings.

**"For your sins," **the Eversor's eyes brightened, filling the room with a ghastly red light. _**"There is a price."**_

The Riddler backed into the wall as the assassin stepped towards him, he wracked his brain for something, _anything_, that could save him.

"Uh-um... riddle me thi-" Edward was cut off as CIXIV grabbed him by the throat with one hand, and his ever shrinking balls with the neurogauntlet. Lifting him in the air over his head like a pinata, the Eversor assassin snapped the Riddler's scrawny, naked body over his ceramite armored knee, filling the hideout with a sound akin to a holiday cracker being opened on Sanguinala, only much louder, and nobody got any Primarch finger puppets.

* * *

The downtown GCPD headquarters had been a madhouse all day. With so many officers pulling double shifts, tempers were beginning to wear thin. Commissioner James Gordon himself was having a particularly bad case of the Mondays.

Shortly after returning from the scene of Roxy Sutton's violent murder; reports of random killings began to land on his desk, all of them bearing the maniac of the hour's distinct MO. Worse still many of these homicides had taken place in the open, making containing the inevitable shitstorm impossible.

Gotham City's media services were every bit as rabid as Arkham Asylum's supermax security inhabitants. The news outlets were a never ending deluge of the city's general state of ne'er do well. And with this latest killing spree shaping up to be the most prolific in the history of the city, the press was eager to spread the hysteria in any way they possibly could.

And so it was with growing exasperation that Gordon walked into the latest crime scene, ending yet another day knee deep in corpses. He found Harvey Bullock just as the forensics team were preparing lower a tarp over Edward's folded remains. Being sure to stay clear of the puddle blood and spinal fluid, he made his way to Bullock's side.

"What have you got Harv?"

"The runs," the detective answered as he took a bite out of a large burger whilst staring grimly down at Nigma's lethally deformed body, "Knew there was something fishy about that guacamole."

"The only thing fishy is your attitude!" The commissioner snapped, having grown tired of the detective's unbelievable nonchalance to these massacres, it was like nothing could move him, "Now be straight with me."

"Near as I can tell, somebody walked in on the scrote during happy alone time, and then decided to flatten his sack and break his spine in half." He gestured to the corpse, bent to the point where Nigma's shoulder blades were touching his pasty white ass cheeks, the crushed remains of underdeveloped genitalia gruesomely laid bare, a death rictus of pure agony frozen on his weasel-like face. Gordon sighed in relief when the hideous gangly body was finally covered by the tarp.

"At firs' glance it looks like Bane's MO, but I am not too sure 'bout that." Bullock said.

"How do you figure that?" The Commissioner asked.

"That angry bastard like to break backs for sure, but I don't recall any instance of him completely foldin' someone in half before. And the wounds on the other stiffs are consistent with the ones at the Twin Cities. Looks like tall dark and batshit crazy is branchin' out."

"Harvey." Gordon cautioned.

"All 'ahm sayin' is that anyone who dresses up like a bat and acts edgy all the damn time has got serious issues."

"At the time Sutton was being roasted alive, Batman was stopping a rape on the other side of the district, put your suspicions to rest lieutenant."

"Yeah, Boss, I got it." Harvey sighed, "We will be going through paperwork for years because of this whacko."

Gordon grimaced, internally agreeing. Casing a dead body was a tasking process, one that could take several hours or even days depending on the condition of the corpse. A body that had been riddled with bullets would take far more time to process than one that had it's neck snapped; now imagine how much time it would take the morticians to properly case a body that had it's skull crushed, spleen ripped out, and everything beneath the waist pulverized.

"These bodies will need to be sent to Bludhaven," Gordon said tiredly.

"Why over there? We got things covered," Harvey snorted.

"Because our morgue is starting to get full, they are still working over the mess our psycho left at Twin Cities."

"God dammit," Bullock cursed, "You informed them of their unexpected meat order?"

"Yes, I also put Metropolis and New York on notice; just in case we end up overwhelming Bludhaven as well."

Frustration and fatigue clawed at his mind and he could feel the small package in his coat calling to him.

"I am going to step out for a while." Gordon said.

"Yep." Bullock replied, continuing with his dinner. Gordon would have to chew him out about that later.

Gordon quickly found a secluded corner for a smoke. Lighting up one of the cancer sticks he took in a refreshing drag of nicotine. He should not have been surprised when a gravely voice spoke from the darkness.

"This is just the beginning."

"Is that a confession?" Gordon asked, turning around to behold the caped crusader stepping from the shadows.

"An observation," he replied.

"Any suspects yet?"

"No," Batman said, "Whoever or whatever this is, it's a newly emerged case. You have a spree killer on your hands Jim. Whenever he isn't murdering someone he is stalking another victim."

"Any leads?"

"A woman reported that her downtown apartment had been destroyed and her daughter missing, the Riddler's calling card was at the scene. I suspect that this is where the killer has been staying in between his bouts of mass murder. Nigma kept backups of all his dealings and one of them indicated that the missing girl had been kidnapped by him and sold to Victor Fries."

"You think there is a connection between this girl and our killer?"

"Yes."

"So if we find Freeze, we find the killer."

"This is the best chance we have now to get in front of this," Batman confirmed, "But only if I can find him first."

"Freeze has been missing for months, are you certain you can find him before the killer takes him apart?" Gordon asked skeptically.

"I have to. If you find any leads, you know how to call me."

**End of the Second Day**

**97 killed 1 cat and 9 squirrels.**

* * *

**A/N: HAPPY NEW YEARS! I am happy to celebrate it with the death of my lease favorite villain in DC and the promise of the appearance of one of my favorites. I am sorry again for my lateness, but the battle against depression is a long one, but I feel like I am making progress.**


End file.
